The Dylan Thomas Murders (22 page)

The Curator looked nonplussed but took me down into the basement to show me a room full of boxes. Signor Berti's bequest to the museum, he explained, as yet unopened and uncatalogued. He could not guarantee that Dylan's script was there because some of Berti's papers had been pirated by the university in Florence. Still, progress was being made, and a committee had been set up to explore how the museum might fulfil the honour bestowed upon it by the late Signor Berti. These things take time... Yes, he remembered Signor Dylan, a kind man who gave the children chocolate and taught the miners “the English push penny” across the café tables. And Signora Dylan... truly a beautiful woman, very especial...

That evening, I did another stint in the café when the bank reopened, had dinner at La Cannochia, and ended up in the Karl Marx with the old comrades.

The bar was very much as Rosalind had described it. It reminded me of the salt beef cafés behind Leicester Square that were filled with photos of boxers, except that the Karl Marx was decorated from floor to ceiling with images of Communist Party leaders around the world. These were dominated by a line of black and white portraits of every Soviet President since Lenin. And, behind the bar, were the heroes of the Italian left. Gramsci had pride of place, with Togliatti, the two founding fathers of the Communist Party in Italy. Next to them was Giacomo Matteotti, brutally murdered by Mussolini's fascist gangs, his body hidden in a barrel of salted anchovies, preserving sufficient evidence for his killers to be brought to justice after the war. It was indeed a place of homage.

The back wall of the café was laid out with as much care and reverence. This was entirely taken up with a series of photos of AC Portoferraio, matched against various clubs from the Soviet Union, most notably the Kiev Iron Workers XI. The side wall seemed altogether more eclectic, with an assortment of photos that included Marconi, Sophia Loren, Verdi, and Gianluca Vialli.

I didn't notice Dylan's photo until late in the evening, when the bar had started to empty. It was tucked away above the lintel of the café's front window, and partly obscured by a climbing oleander. Carlo, the elderly owner, seemed delighted I was taking an interest, and immediately fetched a pair of scissors to cut back the leaves of the plant.

It was a portrait of a group in bathing costumes, signed “Webfooted Dylan, Porticciolo, 1947”. Dylan stood in the centre of the photo, with Caitlin on one side, and a young and beautiful Rosalind on the other. Curiously, the man next to Rosalind was not Ian Fleming but someone I didn't recognise, perhaps a local, because he was deeply tanned. Even more curious, Rosalind was just as brown, unlike Dylan and Caitlin who had the blotchy patches of people on holiday who'd been in the sun too long. A little boy stood in front of Dylan, presumably Waldo, looking even browner than his mother. Carlo took the photo down, blew off the dust and polished it clean with a bar cloth. “You like Signor Dylan?” he asked.

I nodded. “A fine poet, a good Welshman.”

“A true socialist. Come.”

Carlo took me by the arm, and led me out of the bar. We went down through a dark passage to the back of the building. He ushered me into his living room which, like the bar, was full of photographs. On the far wall was an old oak door. I thought at first it was the way into another room, but then I saw it was screwed to the wall and hung some way off the ground. Carlo took me across. “My loved possession,” he said.

The door was riddled with splintered holes, some large enough for me to put my finger through. Just above was a piece of paper that had been framed and covered with glass. It was a poem, and the handwriting was very familiar. “Door come from old
gabinetto
,” said Carlo.

The holes, he explained, had been made by the Germans during the war. His sister, Francesca, had been out one day picking wild strawberries in the hills. She'd seen blood on the bushes and called some of the men from the Resistance. After a long search, they found a wounded American airman hiding in a cave. In darkness, they brought him to the town and made a bed for him in one of the café's outhouses. He was soon fit and well, and ready to be taken off the island. But the day before he was due to leave, the Germans raided the bar. An informer, said Carlo, spitting on the carpet.

The soldiers came crashing into the Karl Marx in the early morning. Francesca dropped to her knees, and managed to crawl out from behind the counter. She ran to the kitchen where the American was making himself some coffee. There was only one place to hide him, in the space above the ceiling in the
gabinetto
. She dragged him inside and bolted the door. She sat on the toilet seat and he climbed on her shoulders to pull himself up. The Germans came down the passage. They shouted and banged on the locked door. Francesca refused to come out, the American was still not up in the ceiling. Finally, the soldiers opened fire.

They found Francesca slumped dead on the seat. The American had managed to get into the space above, and the Germans never found him.

“She gave up her life to save him,” I said.

“No, Signor,” replied Carlo, tears running down his cheeks. “She died to save family. If they find American, we die too.”

I asked about the poem. Carlo gave a big smile. From Signor Dylan, he said, written after Carlo had told him the story of Francesca and the airman. He reached out and gave me a chair to stand on so I could read it properly. There was no title, just a dedication:

For Francesca i.m.
 
Because you said I must not lose it
Not the beaming moon nor noonlight
Spy out its place
Bedded on an untended grave
Weighted by sea-deep coral brain
Below the owl-perch stone
 
Loss-fear brought midnight madness,
Daylight named it rage
I'll climb the hill and fetch in flowers
You are not lost, only away.
   Con sympatia, Dylan.

I climbed down. There were tears in my eyes now. “You weep for Francesca?” asked Carlo, putting his arm round my shoulder.

“For a friend,” I replied.

“A good friend?”

“A very good friend.”

We walked back to the bar in silence. “A grappa, Signor?”

I nodded. “The man in the photograph, next to Signorina Hilton?” I asked.

“Giovanni Chiesa.”

“Who kept the hotel where Dylan stayed?”

“The same.”

“And Signor Fleming? Did he take the picture?”

“The name I not know.”

“He came here with Signorina Hilton in 1947.”

Carlo looked confused. “Impossible.”

“They came on holiday.”

“On holiday? But Signorina Hilton live here in Rio many years. Why holiday?”

Now it was my turn to look confused. “But she came to see Dylan and Caitlin. They were old friends, from before the war.”

“Impossible. They meet for first time in Rio. I saw it myself.”

“In 1947?”

“
Si, naturalmente
.”

“Then who is this young boy?”

“Waldino Chiesa.”

My head was spinning, reality reeling away from me, pulled by a gravitational force I didn't understand. “Giovanni was the father?”

Carlo gave me a pitying look. “
Naturalmente
.”

I sat down at the table near the window. Carlo bought me another grappa. “She was spy, working
al coperto
.”

“Under cover?”

“Si. Signorina Hilton, she came at start of war, dropped under
paracadute
. Special soldiers.”

“The SOE?”

Carlo shrugged his shoulders. “She teaching partisans. Blow up bridges, stop iron mines, help soldiers like the American. Very brave signorina. Then she hit.” Carlo grinned broadly, and drew back his arm as if he were firing a bow. “Giovanni send arrow.”

“They were lovers?”

“Si. Next she was... .” He paused, and blew out his stomach as far as he could. “...
incinta
.”

“With Waldino?”

“Si. She tells Londra. She must come home, she says, to have baby. No, they say, you stay. Baby good cover.”

“And she lived with Giovanni?”

“No, he had wife, so she have room in hotel, with baby.”

“Where's Waldino now?”

“Here, in mountains.”

“Does he come to the bar?”

“No, I stop him, he always fighting,” said Carlo. “
Un temperamento violento
,” he added, tapping the side of his head with his finger.

“So what happened in 1947?”

“Dylan and wife come to Giovanni's hotel. She fall in love with Giovanni. Dylan meet Signorina Hilton here in this bar first time. Never before. She fall in love with him.”

“And then?”

“Dylan go home to England. Signorina Hilton follow after.”

“And Waldino went with her, of course.”

“
Naturalmente
.”

I thanked him for his help and kindness, and said it was time to go. He shook my hand. “You are only person never offer money for door of
gabinetto
.” He reached below the bar, and pulled out a bulging file of papers. “Letters come from over world.”

I glanced through them, mostly American universities wanting the Francesca poem. “I never sell,” said Carlo. “Last year, Englishman come, not very nice.”

“Tall?” I asked, “with two small children?”

“Si,” replied Carlo, “and with very strong wife.”

Ogmore Stillness had indeed cast his net widely.

The next morning I came down to breakfast early but by the time Signora Profetti had fussed in the kitchen and dealt with early morning callers, I was way behind my schedule for being at the café before the bank opened. Then, Signora Profetti started complaining about my “milk skin.” I was, she said, “not healthy in the body.” I spent too much time in the café. She implored me to sit by the sea to let the sun “crack the damp joints.” Furthermore, she insisted I take off my trousers and wear shorts. Brown knees were a sign of inner peace. That I had no shorts was of little consequence. Her late husband had a drawerful and it would make him happy if I were to choose one.

I started the long descent to the harbour, wearing a pair of Signor Profetti's tartan shorts. I waved goodbye, and earned a nod of approval from Signora Profetti by moving out of the shade into the heat. The sun was already hot enough to quiet the caged song birds that hung from every window. The air smelt of dog rose, drifting in from the
macchia
, and synthetic lemon steaming off the white linen hung out across the narrow, cobbled streets. And at every corner, as I turned to descend another flight of steps, the blue blistering sea, as Dylan had described it, called me onwards, gleaming and sparkling like sheets of polished steel.

I by-passed the harbour, busy with tourists waiting to catch the ferry, and walked out along the mole, past the rotting jetty where Dylan had watched the scorched and naked miners drag the rusty trolleys full of ore to the waiting ships. Half way out, I turned to wave to the top of the town, where I knew Signora Profetti would be watching to see that I had taken her advice. By the time I returned to the harbour, the sun had already turned my legs pink, and I was ready for a cold beer. I stopped at the stall outside the fish market, bought a bottle of
nazionale
, and sat in the coolness of a large myrtle tree, watching the crowded ferry head out to sea.

The bank had now been open an hour, so I hurried to claim my table at Da Alfonso's. At the corner of Via Ginestra, I found myself caught up in a group of elderly women coming out from morning mass. The cool air from the church soothed my burnt legs and I was tempted for a moment to go inside. But the ornate interior seemed claustrophobic in its over-powering bad taste. As I curved like a tartan porpoise through the shoal of black dresses, I wondered about the cultural consequences of celibacy. If the Papacy had allowed its priests to marry, the post-renaissance makeover of its churches would have been far more tastefully achieved.

The Ford Edsel stuck out like a sore thumb in a china shop. For one thing, its colour, a red and yellow trim with a spruce green roof, and whitewall tyres. For another, it was parked in the illegal zone outside the Banca Commerciale. I stopped on the corner at the end of the Via Scaligeri and watched a group of schoolboys giggle at the vaginal contours of the car's chrome radiator grill. I looked across to find my table in the café, and there was Waldo, sitting with two of the men from the lobster boats.

A policeman came out of the bank, pushing his wallet into the back pocket of his trousers, a Polizia Urbana, much resented for their speeding tickets and parking fines. He stopped beside the Edsel, and pretended to give it a polish with the sleeve of his uniform. Crossing to the café he embraced Waldo warmly, sat down at the table, ordered a coffee and started to tell a long story which soon had Waldo and the two fisherman laughing.