This Crumbling Pageant Page 3

  “I saw who did it, Luca,” said a pipsqueak voice in the doorway. It was one of his classmates, a frail, Roman-nosed young man. A talented draftsman.

  “Tell me!” Luca growled. He rose with a fury that somehow felt both boundless and well tailored. Luca was an individual already disposed to towering, mushrooming rage. Every third man in the old town could vouch for it. He was the angriest of angry artists, quick to find offense in insults so small it was a question they even existed. Outright disrespect and bald-faced injuries were therefore like red meat to the teeth-gnashing Luca Gallo. “I’ll beat him to a pulp. What is your name again?”

  “Pietro.”

  “Of course. Now, tell me, Pietro: the name of the bastard.”

  In a shaky voice, Pietro said, “It was Tirozzi and his friends—the ones who are always slithering around the columns of Via Zamboni.”

  Luca raised a sustained moan. “Oh, Tirozzi! How I hate you! But who is he, Pietro? I don’t think I know him. And why would he do this to me? But it doesn’t matter. Whoever he is, I’ll skin him alive!” He took up a box cutter lying on a stool and brandished it. “I’ll open his belly and feed his cowardly organs bit by bit to my tabby cat. No, no, don’t be frightened, Pietro. I’m not going to harm you. In fact, tonight we will go to the bar and I will buy you a liter of wine for your loyalty, if I can find someone who’ll lend me the money. But first, tell me exactly what you saw. How many were there? What manner of wretches were they? Use all your talents of description. I want to visualize the scene in my head, so that one day I may render it in paint, on a canvas as large as the element, and I will call it The Last Barbarians in Italy.”

  “You know him, Luca,” said Pietro. “Tirozzi is in our program. He is that preppy-looking one, skinny skinny skinny, very hairy arms like a beast.”

  “I know him,” Luca said.

  Pietro sank his voice to a whisper. “It was late last night. I was doing some sketches down the hall when I heard the commotion. Out of fear, I stayed back and watched in secret. But even so I was able to identify Carlo, that loon, laughing every time someone tore through your paintings with his butterfly knife or bare hands. As far as I could tell, he did not touch anything himself, but his appalling, high-pitched laughter made him, in my opinion, the worst and guiltiest of the bunch.”

  “I hate him like the devil hates holy water!”

  “Another was Lorenzo Finistrelli. He only seemed interested in destroying your abstract paintings.”

  Luca scowled. “Okay, so they’re not for everybody.”

  “I believe another was Enzo, the baker’s son.”

  “This is becoming quite a catalogue. Was that all?”

  Pietro heaved a weary sigh. “There were so many, Luca. So very many. From the university quarter and elsewhere.” He thought about it some more, and then his face lit up. “Oh, and your cousin Gianni was there!”

  Two screams from outside brought them to the window. Down below was Via Zamboni, the main artery of the university. As always, it was swamped with the same lounging, ragtag, piratical student body, with here and there one of the punkish drug addicts who were as much a staple of Bologna as its namesake lunchmeat.

  “Look,” said Luca lightly. He indicated a small group of roistering scholars below. They were standing in a ring on the street. In the middle were two boys, pushing each other in the chest and exchanging words. There was a girl watching them, and whenever one of the boys in the middle would deliver a more decisive push, or a less equivocal word, she would yelp.

  Luca watched from his perch and reflected aloud, “Tirozzi dislikes me because I’m a better painter than he is. But why shouldn’t I be? He’s a better sculptor than I am. He resents me because I’m more handsome than he is. I’m not bragging—he’s told me many times. Of course he says it with a smile, as if in jest, but after a dozen times the joke becomes old! Tirozzi hates me because of Vania.”

  Pietro’s attention was directed to the girl below.

  “He thinks I’m after his girlfriend,” Luca continued, in disbelief. “Simply because I allow her to clean up my studio.”

  Finally, the two street-combatants clinched, and then wrangled. Luca clucked his tongue and pushed the windows open wide.

  “Ragazza!” he called out in a lazy rasp, baring his teeth.

  The girl gazed up dumbly at the summons. Luca pointed gigantically down, and beckoned her to him.

  &

  The dean of the Università di Bologna was a thin, baggy-eyed man in an elegant suit, with a neat mustache on his deadpan face. He sat behind his walnut desk, in front of bright windows bedashed with rain.

  Seated opposite him were Luca Gallo, in his paint-streaked clothes, and Stefano Tirozzi, wearing jeans, a blue Oxford shirt, an argyle sweater vest, bandages, and a temporary tooth.

  “I called both your mothers today,” the dean said.

  Tirozzi fixed his eyes on the dean’s desk as if it were a coffin. He wore a suitable expression for the occasion. Luca sat back with his legs crossed, inspecting the office décor. On the walls were movie and music memorabilia, heavy on the Marcello Mastroianni and, surprisingly, Bob Dylan.

  “Stefano,” the dean said, “I’m afraid your mother was very upset. I interrupted her in the middle of a business meeting, and yet she begged me, in tears, to give you another chance. Luca, I could not reach your mother, but your grandmother wanted me to ask you to pick up some lottery tickets on your way home today. She made me promise I would pass the message along, so...” The dean shook his head, and showed the palms of his hands, as if to illustrate that he had washed them clean of that particular matter.

  The office was quiet except for the rain, and except for a slight sniffling sound, coming somewhere from the region of Stefano Tirozzi. Luca and the dean directed a couple of interested glances his way. Tirozzi raised his head defiantly, daring them with his eyes. Then he broke out in tears.

  “Ick.” Luca turned away in his chair. “It’s disgusting.”

  The dean said, “So, Luca. What about this more disturbing accusation against you? The box cutter? Is it true?”

  “Of course not.” The question seemed to hurt his feelings. He went on to disavow most of the stories circulated about him. They were exaggerations, by and large, or plain rumors, floated by the interested and repeated by the gullible. While Luca continued to plead his case, the blubbering Tirozzi had gotten to his feet and was gathering up his shirt and sweater. Bawling openly and without interruption, he revealed his twiggy midriff. The dean winced when he saw the bruises, but he didn’t see anything else out of the ordinary. Sniveling, Tirozzi helped point it out: a series of welts, rising above his pelvis.

  The dean leaned in for a closer look. Out loud, he read, “L, G, A, G.” He gaped at Luca. “Is this your work?”

  “Please!” Luca Giovanni Armando Gallo scoffed. “What do you take me for? A psychopath? Besides,” he went on, recrossing his legs, “it’s an obvious forgery. That’s nothing like my handwriting.”

  Tirozzi bleated, “Oh and I suppose I did it to myself, then!”

  “Maybe you did,” Luca said, in the generous tone of one who is not inclined to judge. “Maybe that’s how you get your ‘kicks.’” He used the actual English word “kicks,” thinking it might appeal to a Dylan fan. Luca winked at the dean. “I always suspected he had an unhealthy interest in me.”

  The dean didn’t react. Then he threw himself back in his chair and lit a cigarette.

  “Both of you,” he began, “strut around these halls as if you were high-born princes and everyone around you—your fellow students, even your professors—must make way when you pass. You treat this place as if it were your protective domain, a kingdom where you are free to do whatever you please. Well, if this is a kingdom, then that makes me the king. Therefore I am banishing the two of you. Go take your war to the outside world.” He leaned forward and looked at them seriously. “You understand what I’m saying? You’re ex
pelled.”

  Composing himself, Tirozzi said, “Dean Civitello, please. Can I just say one thing? I’m not disputing that Luca and I have been involved for a long time now in a juvenile and escalating game of tit for tat—”

  “Oh, what the devil are you talking about!” Luca Gallo thundered. “Before this, I’ve barely even registered your existence! I don’t know what he’s up to, Dean, but he better put a stop to it, if he knows what’s good for him.” He smote the desk with a colossal fist.

  “Enough,” Dean Civitello said, suddenly weary. “Enough from the both of you. Stefano, I want you to leave my office and this building at once.” He looked at his watch. “You have a five-minute head start before I release Luca. You can stay and argue if you want, but it won’t change a thing, and you will only lose precious time to flee. Therefore I advise you—”

  Tirozzi was out the door before he could finish.

  The dean stubbed out his cigarette and tossed his pack to Luca. “Let him go,” he entreated. He told him he was sorry he had to turn him out on the streets like this. That boy’s mother was a real viper. As a show of support, however, he said he would like to commission a painting. “A landscape painting, if it’s not too much trouble. I’ve always liked your landscapes the best.”

  5

  Over the course of the next week, Scott and Holly bought several things for their new pet. Most of the stuff they purchased from this tiny variety shop next door. It was an exceptionally dreary place, cluttered with all manner of junk held in by retaining walls of chicken wire. The one thing Scott liked about the store were the canaries kept outside the door, and he would wander out to be with them while the owner scavenged his shop for a collar, a squeeze toy, a milk bone, a cage.

  They took the dog to the vet to get his vaccinations, scheduled the booster shots, and discussed the best time to have him neutered. When questioned by Holly, the veterinarian suggested that the dog wasn’t really mute, but “maybe just a little shy.”

  Holly also spent the time writing her résumé in Italian and then sending it out to every museum and gallery she could find. It used to be a dream of hers—a fever dream—to work with art in Italy, until she actually looked into it and realized how impossibly competitive it was. But since she was here now, she decided she might as well go down swinging. She had some experience, interning at the Gardner Museum one summer, and though it was mainly administrative, she padded it up bravely and hoped for the best.

  As for Scott, he waited. He waited and waited and waited (mostly in his boxers) for the antique dealer to contact them.

  “Holly,” he would say, always in a tense singsong. “He’s not calling.”

  “I know,” she would reply sadly. “I’m sorry. What should we do?”

  But there was nothing they could do.

  They planned day trips to Venice, San Marino, and Ferrara, and longer excursions to locations in the south, like Naples and Syracuse—spots they had missed during their initial three-week tour around the peninsula. They tossed out names for the dog and shot down each one. Holly gave Scott a number from a flier advertising Italian lessons. Scott continually checked his e-mail to see if his agent had written, even though an e-mail from Lou Prez meant only bad news. Good news would warrant a phone call. Seeing if Lou had written was therefore a neat illustration of courting rejection. Yet Scott persisted in logging on compulsively.

  By Friday, the sixth day, it hit him. They were waiting around for nothing.

  “She’s not going to sell us the painting,” he said to Holly, almost mockingly. “In fact, we’re morons for asking.”

  Who was this woman, anyway? What type? Scott could hazard a guess. She was the menopausal shopaholic. She was the type of scatterbrain whose place would be so cluttered with “rescued” antiques that, in her possession, the painting would simply settle in for another lengthy bout of obscurity, comfortably gathering dust on her mantel for years and years to come—ample time for Scott, the flimflam man, to grift her out of a masterpiece, provided, of course, two idiots like himself and Holly didn’t come along and start drooling over it.

  “We blew it,” Scott moaned. “We tipped her off. Why did we do that?”

  “Tomorrow is Saturday,” Holly reminded him. “We’ll go to the market and find out for sure what happened.”

  “She’s probably flying off to Christie’s as we speak.”

  Next morning they were back at the marketplace, approaching the little white tent full of antiques. Scott’s eyes did a quick sweep. Everything was arranged as before, minus the painting.

  The dealer was relaxing on a plastic chair and pleating his right-leaning newspaper when Scott and Holly cornered him. Again Holly did the talking. Fluent though her Italian was, the merchant looked up from his paper like one whose philosophical investigations have been interrupted by the oracles of a lunatic. Gingerly, she reminded him of their conversation the previous Saturday. Before she could finish, he sat up with wide eyes and slapped his forehead.

  “Ooh Gesù!” Oh Jesus, he said in a high voice. “Mi sono dimenticato!” I forgot.

  He was ashamed of himself.

  “Sul mio onore!” On my honor, the self-styled man of honor began. Scott could sense that some solemn vow was on the way, but thankfully Holly put a stop to it. She assured the dealer that everything was okay, that actually they had changed their minds about the painting, and so he could just forget about it. Really. Please. Forget all about it.

  &

  They went to McDonald’s. Italians of every description were packed inside. Scott and Holly were able to claim two stools facing the window. Scott wiped the steam from the glass.

  “Perfect,” he said. They had a nice, unobstructed side view of the antique dealer’s tent. Holly put her purse down on the stool, took out her wallet, and went to the counter to order. Scott sat on his jacket and settled in for the duration.

  He was relieved they hadn’t already missed the woman. They had gotten a late start that morning, thanks to Holly. Not for the first time, Scott privately questioned his wife’s level of dedication. From the outset, she had appeared almost content to let the painting lie where it chanced to fall. Her guiding philosophy seemed to be, If we get it—great. If not, oh well, it wasn’t meant to be. This kind of submissive fatalism was maddening. At the same time, Scott envied her for it. This was not the universe as he dimly conceived it. Rather, the universe consisted of malleable forces that were there to be bent, and sometimes beaten, into shape.

  Holly returned with a tray of fries and vanilla milkshakes and, for Scott, a fish sandwich whose top bun—he learned upon opening the box—was upside down. He bit into it as is.

  “They don’t serve breakfast here,” she remarked.

  Silently they munched on their food and stared out the window. There was a spattering of rain, but the sky remained luminous. It was fun doing a stakeout.

  Scott was the first to speak. “What’s the date today?”

  Holly said with her mouth full that it was November 5th.

  “How long have we been in Italy?”

  “It’ll be a month tomorrow.”

  He sucked on his straw and grew thoughtful. He could have remembered these details himself, but he wanted to hear them said aloud so he could wallow in their significance.

  November 5th. The World Series would be over by now, and he didn’t even know who played. This would have been impossible back home and partly explained why he was so willing to go abroad. By now, though, the nation would have forgotten all about baseball and flown madly into the bulging arms of its lover, football. The coast would be clear, if he wanted to return.

  “Oh,” Holly said. “I printed out some information for you on getting certified as a phys. ed teacher. You should look through it. It’s actually pretty straightforward.”

  Scott frowned out the window. Where was that damn woman?

  Holly brushed his hair from his face. “I think you’d like working wi
th kids. You’d be good at it.”

  In fact, Scott had been dwelling on the same sore subject only the night before, after he had sat down at the desk with their bank statements and mustered up enough courage to tally the numbers.

  They didn’t look good. This long spree was going to blow through their entire savings. When he and Holly returned home they would be broke, financially-embarrassed, and would have to rely on their families for help. Scott would have to eke out a living doing whatever. Holly was considering going back to school, but was torn between studying art again, or changing directions completely and studying medicine. Either way, they were going to have money troubles for a long time. Scott had already looked into becoming a gym teacher. Part-time it would take six years to get certified. Whatever course Holly chose would take even longer. Secretly, Scott was fretting over something else: If his wife did finally decide on becoming a doctor, how would she feel about being married to a gym teacher? He couldn’t think of a single couple where the wife’s status so plainly outranked the husband’s. Not so secretly, he voiced this concern to his wife.

  “That’s silly,” she said. “You know how many women are doctors nowadays? What, are they all supposed to marry other doctors?”

  “They usually do,” he said. Outside, the marketplace was filling up. It was getting hard to see. “Look at your parents.”

  “Well,” said Holly, with an accent of helplessness, “maybe we’ll find some work here.”

  This wasn’t the answer he was looking for.

  “Oh!” she exclaimed. “There’s something else I wanted to tell you. I ran into Luca yesterday while walking the dog—”

  “Sherman,” Scott interrupted.

  “No,” she corrected him, “not Sherman. Boswell, maybe.”