Tales of Madness (10 page)

At first the poor fellow was strangely astonished at my blunder. For quite a while during the trip from the station to the hotel he mulled over the idea, and finally, taking me by the arm, his greatly dilated eyes staring into mine, he shouted at me:

"Pitagora, you're right!"

"What do you mean, dear Tito?"

"I mean you're right!" he repeated, without letting go of me, and with a glimmer of terrifying light in his eyes, which became increasingly more dilated. "You weren't mistaken! The person
you have been greeting is me. Really me, Pitagora! I've never left
Rome! Never! Never! Whoever says the opposite is my enemy! Here, here. You're right, I've always been here in Rome, young, free, happy, as you've been seeing and greeting me every day. My dear Pitagora, ah, now I can breathe! I can breathe! What a burden you've taken off my mind! Thanks, dear friend, thanks, thanks... I'm happy! Happy!"

And turning to his brother-in-law:

"We've had a terrible dream, my dear Quirino! Give me, give me a kiss! I hear the cock crowing again in my old studio in Rome! Pitagora here can tell you. Right, Pitagora? Right? Every
day you meet me here in Rome... And what do I do in Rome? Tell
Quirino. I'm a painter! A painter! And I sell, right? If you spot me laughing, it means I'm selling. Ah, it's going quite well... Hurrah for youth! A bachelor, free, happy..."

"And your bride-to-be?" I unfortunately let slip from my tongue, not noticing that Renzi, in telling about my blunder a little while back, had prudently left out this dangerous detail.

Tito's face suddenly darkened. This time he took hold of both my arms.

"What did you say? How's that? I'm getting married?"

And he looked at his brother-in-law, dumbfounded.

He again burst out crying, covering his face with his hands. Renzi and I tried unsuccessfully to quiet him, to console him.

"No, no!" he continued, shouting in reply. "If I get married even here in Rome, I'm ruined! Ruined! Do you see what state I've been reduced to in Forli, my dear Pitagora? Save me, save me, for heaven's sake! You have to prevent me from it at all costs, immediately! Even there I began by playing around."

And he trembled all over, as if shivering with fever.

"But we're just going to be here for a few days," Renzi said to him. "Only enough time to negotiate the sale of your paintings with two or three gentlemen, as we had agreed. We'll be returning to Forli right away."

"It won't do any good!" replied Tito, with a desperate gesture of his arms.

"We'll be returning to Forli, and Pitagora will still continue to
see me here in Rome! How can it be otherwise? I've always been
living here in Rome, my dear Quirino, even though I live up there. Always in Rome, always in Rome, in the flower of my youth, unmarried, free, happy. Exactly as Pitagora saw me just yesterday, right? Yet we were in Forli yesterday. Can't you see I'm not telling lies?"

Moved, exasperated, Quirino Renzi relentlessly shook his head and squinted to stop the tears. Until then, his brother-in-law's madness had not appeared so terribly serious to him.

"Come on, come on," continued Tito, turning towards me. "Let's go. Bring me immediately to the place where you usually
see me. Let's go to my studio in Via Sardegna! At this time of day
I should be there. I just hope I won't be at my girlfriend's place!"

"How's that? You're here with us, my dear Tito!" I exclaimed with a smile, hoping to bring him back to his senses. "Are you speaking in earnest? Don't you know that I'm famous for making blunders? I've mistaken a gentleman who resembles you for you."

To prevent him from going alone, we were forced to accompany him. As we walked, I said to him:

"Pardon me, but don't you remember that you no longer live on Via Sardegna?"

He stopped, perplexed at this remark of mine. He looked at me angrily for a while, then said:

"And where do I live? You should know better than I."

"Me? Oh, that's a good one! How do you expect me to know that, if not even you know it?"

My answer seemed quite convincing to me, and such as to keep him motionless and nailed to the spot. I didn't know that even the so-called mad possess that most complicated little thought-producing machine known as logic, which is in perfect running order, perhaps even more so than ours, in that, like ours, it never stops, not even in face of the most inadmissible deductions.

"Me? I don't even know that I'm about to get married! Since I
live in Forli, how do you expect me to know what I'm doing here,
alone in Rome, free as I once was? You probably know, since you see me every day! Let's go, let's go. Accompany me. I'm putting myself into your hands."

And, as we walked, he would turn towards me from time to time with silent, imploring, inquisitive eyes that pierced my heart, because with those eyes he was telling me that he was
going along the streets of Rome in search of himself — in search
of that other self, free and happy, of the good old days. And he would ask me if I could see him around anywhere, since he was looking for him with my eyes, eyes that until yesterday had seen him.

An agonizing worry took hold of me. What if by some misfortune, I thought, we should happen to run into that other
one! He would no doubt recognize him, since the similarity is so
obvious and perfect! And then, with those shoes that squeak at every step, that beast makes everybody turn around! And it seemed to me that from one moment to the next I could hear the dree, dree, dree of those blasted shoes behind me.

Could it perhaps not have happened? Not a chance!

At least this once: try to put yourself in my shoes without laughing! That gentleman, seeing himself looked at and pointed out in that way, became uneasy; but then, noticing me, he
greeted me as usual, so polite was the poor man. With one hand I
secretly tried to signal him, while with the other I attempted to drag Tito away. Not a chance!

Fortunately, the man had understood my signal and was smiling. But he had only understood that my companion was mad. He had not recognized himself in Tito's features, while the latter certainly did in his, and he did so immediately. Of course! They were the same ones he had had three years before... It was himself whom he finally met, as he had been not more than three years before. And he drew near to him and ecstatically contemplated him and caressed his arms and chest, slowly, slowly, as he whispered to him:

"How handsome you are... how handsome you are... This is our dear Pitagora, see?"

That gentleman, embarrassed and fearful, looked at me and
smiled. To calm him, I smiled at him sadly. I wish I had not done
that! Tito noticed that smile of ours and, immediately suspecting some complicity between the two of us, turned menacingly to the man and said:

"Don't get married, imbecile, you'll ruin me! Do you want to end up like me, penniless and desperate? Leave that girl! Don't fool around with her, you stupid scoundrel! Without experience..."

"What gall!" shouted that poor man, turning to me as he saw people running up curious and astonished, and gathering all around us.

I had barely enough time to say: "Have pity on him..." when Tito broke in: "Quiet, traitor."

And he gave me a hard push. Then, turning again to the gentleman, he said in a subdued, persuasive tone of voice:

"Tito! Tito! What happened?"

"What?" answered poor Bindi. "Look at him, there he is! He wants to get married again! You tell him that a blind baby will be born to him... Tell him that..."

Renzi led him away forcibly. A little later I had to explain the whole thing to the gentleman. I expected him to smile over it, but that didn't happen. He asked me, worried:

"But does he really look a lot like me?"

"Oh, not now!" I replied. "But if you had seen him before, three
years ago, a bachelor, here in Rome... You in person!"

"Let's hope then that in three years," he said, "I won't have to end up like him..."

Now tell me, after all this, didn't I have the right to believe that it was all over?

Well, no such luck.

The day before yesterday, about two months after the encounter I described, I received a postcard signed "Ermanno Levera."

It reads as follows:

Dear Sir:

Inform that fellow Bindi that he has been
obeyed. I couldn't forget him any more. He has remained before me like a specter of my imminent destiny. I've
called off the
wedding and tomorrow
I'm
leaving
for
America.