like caged animals going back to the wild. The children welcome their father with capricious jumping and hugging. In unison, these Geppetto puppets screech.
“Daddy what did you get us? What did you
buy?”
“Good to see you too, Andrea, Paola, Luisa,
and you too, my little man, Angelo. Just try not to stampede each other but all your gifts are in the trunk of the car. Here are the keys Angelo. See if you can control your sisters.”
“Of course, papa.”
Turning to his siblings, Angelo holds the keys in the air above his head. “
“Okay, who is going to bake some biscotti for
me this afternoon?”
Emilio laughs and walks away from the trifling tempest. He looks at his wife, Grazia, waiting for her man. A smeared apron is covering her Sunday best clothes, but her smile spices up the homecoming.
Emilio hastens his steps wrapping his arms around Grazia’s solid frame. While she grips his face to plant a sensuous kiss, he grabs her ass and tugs at her, signaling his desires for later that night.
“Did you have a productive trip? Did you visit your brother Pio? What about our dear friend, the Pontiff? Did you close the art deal for the professore? Was he there?”
“Stop. Stop.”
Emilio cannot contain his amusement. “Let’s just say that everything is well and all
is done. At least, for now.”
Looking back at his kids rummaging through gift boxes by the side of the car, Emilio thirsts for a proper espresso.
“Signora, I report to the professore tomorrow. Right now, I need a double espresso with a double shot of grappa.”
Grazia, knowing her place, understands that additional questions are not appreciated and will be ruled out-of-order. Emilio has his limits and “You break them at your peril.”
Chapter 17
Tarquinia, central Italy Piazza Cavour
I feel naughty eating my pastry al fresco. The sunny day sky lessens the gloom and doom drawn up in the daily news. However, I cannot help but muse about how many cappuccinos does it take to equal the feeling of a syringe of morphine?
“May I get you anything else, Mr. Salvo?” The waiter waits patiently. He is a handsome man with calloused fingers, athletic but not muscular with bronzed skin either from regular excursions to the beach or playful afternoons on the football field.
“Yes, another cappuccino, per favore.”
We exchange smiles. A cordial connection that eludes definition links us.
The two-story Albergo Americano rests just
past the entryway to the old town of Tarquinia. It features a café-American restaurant and bar. It is the premier hotel in the old town, central to the tourist attractions and convenient for more casual business or social meetings for locals.
The hotel is located across the street from Piazza Cavour, which is Tarquinia’s first square that flanks the town’s prized museum. From afar, the archaeological museum, situated in Palazzo Vitelleschi, looks boxy. The museum is among the best collections of Etruscan finds in all of Italy. The Etruscans were Italy’s earliest civilization. They settled in the Lazio region and established an aristocratic class of immense cultural and economic power within the Roman Empire. Relics displayed include an Etruscan representation in terra cotta of Cavalli Alati, winged horses from the 4th century BC. This motif smacks of conflict rooted in history threatening the most powerful of modern day, Italian outlaw societies – particularly, the Mafia.
I prefer sitting on the patio rather than in the interior, cavernous restaurant with its smoking patrons. Feeling the heat of the Mediterranean Scirocco breeze, I relocate and plant myself from under the twin canopies to a small table and chair in proximity to the gazebo-style, newspaper stand that shares the quadrangle sizeable space. I want sunshine to warm my body and sunlight to help me read the newspaper without the benefit of my mild prescription reading glasses.
I know enough street language to get by and understand conversations, but I struggle with Italian grammar. Feasting on the headlines, I conclude that
Rome is like any other large city, Toronto, New York or Los Angeles. When too many people traverse each other’s paths, they are bound to produce urban blight and seedy crime. People take action in their own self-interest, oft-times with brutality. Life can be cruel and short. Thomas Hobbes’ view of civil society is not some exaggeration.
Iread that two studentshave been discovered in the waters under Ponte Milvo, a stone bridge in northern Rome constructed in 206 BC. Authorities believe that the two traveling students, an alleged lesbian couple, carelessly fell to their deaths as they tried to attach a padlock to one of the lampposts and profess their love for one another. The bridge is a point of interest for such a ritual, which annually draws hundreds of young boys and girls. It involves a couple locking a padlock to the bridge’s lamppost and then throwing the key behind them into the Tiber River.
In another headline, a man in his early thirties, not previously known by police, has been discovered lifeless in the Hangar. Established in 1984, the Hangar is Rome’s first homosexual pub and still one of the more popular places for gay tourists. Police report that the man, a camera beside him with no memory card, was crouched in a tiny, very dark backroom of the club. The journalist, through inessential repetition, stressed that the death stemmed from a self-inflicted overdose of cocaine.
The most eye-catching news comes from the Vatican Press. Cardinal Pio, the Pontiff’s Secretary of State and controller of the Vatican
Bank, has passed away from natural causes during the Pope’s birthday celebration. How sad. Cardinal Pio was the Holy See’s right-hand man and dearest friend. The Pope has scheduled a dedication high mass for the Cardinal on Sunday. The article goes on to affirm that “a man of the cloth who recently returned from missionary work in Africa will fill the vacancy.” Several statements approve and praise the clergyman’s credentials. The successor is actually Cardinal Pio’s brother.
There is even an eloquent endorsement by a professor from the University of Trento. The Holy See’s describes this professor as “a financial advisor of the Vatican Bank and a treasured, life-long friend.” As if reading the newspaper was insufficient,
a television inside the gazebo changes from telecasting a musical to announcing the morning headlines from Rome. I turn to watch and listen as an attractive, large-breasted, scantily-attired female announcer mouths yesterday’s events.
The woman T.V. reporter speaks with speculation of multiple killings of mayors of major southern Italian cities. Conspiracy theories abound. One co-reporter contends that all these politicians were corrupt individuals snuffed by marginalized non-residents. The female anchorwoman fingers Communists and the Mafia for the more spectacular executions of three prominent magistrates, the head of the Treasury Police, and seven crime investigators of the carabinieri. She speculates that all these deaths are somehow linked. Although I find it hard to take this porn-like presenter seriously, the cavalcade of photos being broadcast are explicit and, the timing
of
