Nanowrimo Winner

11. Aldo’s Legs

My father was embarrassed by the way people would put up plaques or even statues celebrating his contribution to some undertaking. Often enough the tribute was well-deserved, but he would never accept this. In his view the people who laid the bricks were far more deserving of credit for any new building: all he had done was talk. He could rarely be persuaded to cut ribbons or unveil things, even when he had played a crucial role in inspiring and directing the project. On the occasions when he could be made to attend this kind of event, he would often seize someone from the crowd and try to force them to wield the silver trowel or the golden scissors. He said he could not understand why people were so intent on putting him in a false position.

My mother found this attitude irritating, and told him frankly that in her view it was only another species of vanity.

“It’s as if you thought the people’s applause wasn’t good enough for you,” she said.

But at the same time she herself was not always particularly impressed by the monuments and occasions my father was asked to celebrate. She said that many of his best achievements went unnoticed because they had been delivered inconspicuously: some time spent with a factory manager here, a private conversation with a local official there, and something marvellous would happen for which my father would steadfastly deny responsibility.

Her favourite example of his unobserved influence was the famous story of Aldo’s legs. In Dubitania, sports had largely been the preserve of the upper classes, and the country had a poor record in almost everything but shooting, riding and croquet as a result. In this respect Twentyland at first resembled its predecessor; although new sporting opportunities now became available, few of the workers and even fewer of the former peasants felt much inclined to take them up. At the national athletics meeting which would in many cases finalise membership of the Olympic team, the majority of competitors were middle-class, and not a few were former aristocrats. This included one of our best hopes, the marathon runner Athanasi Dilagin, who was the grandson of a former Prince and the nephew of the Archbishop of Andra-Nipoli (who was still Archbishop, by the way, though his income was greatly reduced and he now inhabited only one wing of the archiepiscopal palace).

As Athanasi was warming up near the marathon start, which on this occasion had been set up on the road just outside the stadium, he noticed a young tea-seller whose urn, which he carried strapped to his back, was sticking out into the road slightly; he paused, put his hands on his hips, and shouted – rather curtly perhaps – at the tea-boy to move.

This unpromising opening led to a dialogue in which Athanasi was informed that his ears stuck out, that the country no longer belonged to him, and that his feet were taking up more room than the urn. In return the tea-boy he was told that he was a gipsy, a spiv*, and that he dealt in horse-piss. The interesting prospect of a fight between the two parties was dispelled by onlookers who separated them; they told the tea-seller that this was none other than Athanasi Dilagin the famous runner.

The tea-seller was dressed in traditional embroidered costume of Puttonyi Province, said to be based on a combination of Scythian trousers and the clothes and equipment of a Roman legionary (though to see the resemblance requires some imagination); and he had a dignified moustache which slightly disguised his youthfulness. He smirked and said that he himself was none other than Aldo Forobdin** the famous tea-seller. He observed that Athanasi ran like his mother the feral bitch, and said that if he liked, he, Aldo would show him how to run like a human being. Athanasi’s coach and most of the officials standing by took this as mere insolence, but the small crowd which had gathered was half-seriously on Aldo’s side, and began chanting his name. Athanasi said that if Aldo wanted to join the race, he was all for it.

So at length Aldo put down his urn and, without anything in the way of preparation, walked over to the starting line, where a large group of athletes was already gathered. It was now noticed that below the trousers which ended a few inches above his ankles, he was barefoot. The officials from the Twentyland Athletics Federation frowned and shrugged at each other, but they did not intervene.

Athanasi thoughtfully selected a place as far away as possible from his humble competitor. There was a pause; the gun was fired, and the race began. Knowledgeable onlookers expected Aldo, as a naïve runner, to dash off at an unrealistic pace – it seemed far from clear that he even knew how far he had undertaken to run – but in fact he stumped off stolidly, making no attempt to get to the front. He had promised to show how human beings ran, but he must have seen some strange examples of humanity; he ran with a straight, upright back and with his arms held up as though to elbow the other competitors aside.

Over the next hour or so the story of Aldo’s challenge spread like wildfire, and the crowd waiting around the finishing line grew steadily. Most of the idlers were vaguely on Aldo’s side, but it was no great surprise when after some two and a half hours it was Athanasi who appeared first, looking only a little stressed. He completed the course in good style, turning in a personal best and looking encouragingly as though he could easily have screwed a bit more speed out of his legs.

But then, not much more than five minutes behind, came Aldo. He was clearly suffering, and his peculiar gait had collapsed into a kind of shuffling amble, but as he crossed the line in second place, he got a tremendous ovation. When he had recovered, as the rest of the field were streaming in, Athanasi came forward and offered his hand. Aldo sniffed, and shook it.

“Well, tea-man,” said Athanasi, “You finished, at any rate – that was something. You’ve showed us you can run a bit.”

“You have shoes, and trainers, and money,” observed Aldo, “But I have one thing you will never have. Peasant legs!”

Athanasi laughed good-naturedly, but as Aldo was limping back to pick up his tea-urn, he shouted:

“Next time, keep the bloody urn out of the way!”

Aldo did not respond, but a dark look of anger flashed over his face.

This encounter obviously became well-known in Twentyland, and nearly everyone was full of praise for the plucky tea-boy who had, the papers suggested, exemplified the robust spirit of the nation. The newspapers all carried the story of how he had begun running at the age of twelve when his mother took to sending him off to deliver her home-made Emboustra cheese pie to his aunt’s house fifteen kilometres away every Saturday. Aldo found that if he ran both ways he could get the job done more quickly, and gradually running 30 kilometres without much of a pause became something he was quite used to.

“That extra twelve is no joke, though!” he said

Given the national enthusiasm, it was clear that Aldo would not be allowed to give up competitive running easily. He was quickly inducted into the Amateur Athletic Club of Vegamatrin (the Sescastri club, controversially, refused to have anything to do with him) and the rules were bent to allow him to compete in another marathon some two months later which was also on Athanasi’s schedule. A return contest was too attractive a prospect to be missed.

Athanasi himself made no protest, but his supporters were vocal. They pointed out that Athanasi Dilagin was Twentyland’s best, if not only, hope of a gold medal at the Olympic games. Aldo Forobdin might be a character and something of a prodigy, but was the nation going to put its best chance at risk by staging some meaningless populist rivalry? In any case, although Athanasi might be the descendant of aristocrats, he himself was a simple soldier, whereas Aldo was an entrepreneurial capitalist, albeit on a very small scale.

However, nothing they could say had any effect on the general desire to see Aldo race Athanasi again, and in due course they found themselves standing together on the starting line. Noting that although Aldo was now decked out in brand-new running kit he was still barefoot, Athanasi offered to lend him running shoes; a gesture which evoked only indignation.

“I understand you,” said Aldo, tensely, “You are trying to interfere with my style. You think that with those things flapping around my feet I could not run properly.”

At this Athanasi lost patience, and swore at the tea-seller. They edged apart again and when the whistle blew, Athanasi went well ahead. Aldo, cheered on enthusiastically by bystanders, plugged on in his characteristic style.

At the twenty kilometre mark, a young woman more enthusiastic than the rest leapt out and threw her arms round Aldo’s neck. For a moment he looked merely annoyed, but then spectators cried out in horror as they saw the young woman kick Aldo’s ankle. She was wearing heavy boots with steel toecaps, and poor Aldo immediately fell sideways and rolled on the ground in pain. The young woman disappeared into the crowd.

Aldo waved away the stretcher which had been brought, and after ten minutes’ respite hobbled away again. He had boasted of his legs, and it now seemed that his ankles must have some special strength: within a hundred yards he was running naturally again, or at any rate as naturally as he ever did. Soon, with a grim expression on his face, he was more than making up for lost time. The crowds along the way cheered him on.

In the final mile Aldo at last sighted Athanasi, and began to close the gap. His face was now screwed up into a furious expression, and it seemed that it was anger that was powering his legs up the final straight. Athanasi, somehow sensing the presence of his rival, glanced back and raised his eyebrows in surprise; summoning energy from some inner reserve, he put on a final sprint. He crossed the line just a yard ahead of Aldo.

The two of them jogged a little further together as if they were the best of friends.

“I’ve got to admit, Forobdin,” said Athanasi, “You’re pretty good at second place.”

“Although your sister is a whore,” responded Aldo, disdaining subtlety, “She kicks like a mule.”

“What?”

“She has the face of a mule too. Perhaps instead of running you could ride her – she is clearly well–used to being ridden…”

But Aldo was forced to break off and duck at that point. He easily dodged Athanasi’s fist, and retaliated with a haymaker to Athanasi’s ear. Before anyone could intervene, Dubitania’s leading athletes were engaged in a terrible, flailing fight. When Aldo was at length pulled away from Athanasi, he had a black eye and his fine moustache was twisted down at one side, but he was uninjured: when Athanasi was released, by contrast, he had an ominous limp.

“What the hell is the matter with you, peasant?” he demanded, “Why did you have to insult my sister?”

“She kicked my ankle,” said Aldo with dignity, “So now I have kicked yours.”

“My sister is in France.”

A short man in a straw hat plucked nervously at Aldo’s long sleeve.

“Mr Forobdin,” he said nervously, “The woman who kicked you – they have her. She got out of St Matthew’s Refuge – the lunatic asylum.”

Just for a moment a look of doubt and shame flitted across Aldo’s face.

“You have peasant’s legs alright,” observed Athanasi, “and peasant’s manners; and worst of all, peasant’s brains.”

Matters went from bad to worse over the next few months. It took several weeks before Athanasi’s ankle had recovered sufficiently for him to train again, which was the cause of bitter resentment among his supporters. When at last the Twentyland team marched around the Olympic stadium, it was observed that Aldo was wearing in his belt an opinelca, the traditional Dubitanian shepherd’s knife with a curved blade designed to slit the throats of wolves. People speculated half-seriously about whether he meant to stab Athanasi with it, or merely ward off any lunatics who assaulted him.

At this point my father decided matters had gone far enough. He went down to see the two runners together privately. No-one knows quite what he said to them, but he must surely have called on their patriotism and invoked the shining code of fraternity embodied in Marxist-Larvartism. No doubt he used more down-to-earth language, however: I think it is entirely possible that he simply sat down and said:

“Tell me your problems.”

On the starting line the next day, Athanasi and Aldo looked each other in the eye and solemnly shook hands. Aldo’s supporters were overjoyed when for the first time he was observed to be running just ahead of Athanasi: more sophisticated observers understood that this meant the tea-seller had agreed to help his rival, probably to the detriment of his own chances.

Today, though, it seemed Aldo had legs of iron and nothing could hold him back. Both runners drew slowly ahead of the field, and gradually built up a comfortable lead over a Kenyan runner in third place. But as they came into the last few hundred yards the worst possible disaster took place: Athanasi twisted his weakened ankle. He stopped at once, and Aldo, still a few paces ahead, stopped too.

“Go on, go on!” protested Athanasi, “I’ll be OK. One of us has got to win it.”

Aldo hesitated.

“For Twentyland!” said Athanasi.

Aldo smiled.

“You’re not thinking straight, comrade,” he said, “I don’t want to win a medal for Twentyland but make it into a place where a man runs off and leaves his countryman, do I?”

He stepped forward, turned his back, and suddenly hauled Athanasi up on his back as though he were a tea-urn.

“Aldo!” exclaimed Athanasi, “Put me down and run!”

Aldo tottered towards the finishing line; all at once the Kenyan appeared and swept past with no more than an incurious glance at the two of them. Slowly Aldo began to pick up speed, and he hit the line at a decent trot, only a few minutes behind the Kenyan and a few minutes ahead of a German, the next runner to arrive.

A puzzled official was standing by.

“Give him second place,” said Aldo, putting Athanasi down, “I’ve had enough of it.”

The German approached and said something to the official.

“I’m afraid,” said the official in German, “That your friend will be disqualified. It’s not for me to adjudicate, but this West German gentleman is also contending that you should be disqualified, on the grounds that there was an element of mutual assistance.”

Aldo could not follow this, but Athanasi, who spoke good German, translated for him.

“We don’t care about that,” said Athanasi to the official, “Aldo may not have been the first runner to cross the line today, but he ran the best race.”

The German spoke incomprehensibly to the official again, and gestured assertively at the Twentylanders.

“Oh, give him the medal,” said Athanasi, “Give him both. Give him six medals. Perhaps it will help him feel happy about his sad grey country where everyone must be better than everyone else. Tell him what Comrade Larvartin said; in our country we have one thing that he will never have: socialist legs.”

* ‘listofandi’; much more insulting than the nearest English equivalents, this is fighting talk whoever it is addressed to.
** No relation to any of the other Forobdins mentioned here. ‘Forobdin’ is one of the most common of Dubitanian names, as witness the traditional use of ‘Private Forobdin’ to designate a typical soldier, a sort of Dubitanian ‘Tommy Atkins’ figure.

32,028 words