The Fatal Touch (57 page)
“To be fair to my mother and stepfather, they were probably expecting me back soon, but I never saw either of them again. My stepfather died suddenly of heart failure a few weeks before I reached Rome. My mother had sent a telegram followed by several letters to a poste restante address at the main post office in Piazza San Silvestro, but I arrived several weeks later and did not bother checking for letters until several weeks after that. By the time I had read through the letters, my stepfather was dead almost two months and my mother was so hurt she had decided not to speak to me again. Nor did she, though I do not think she ever intended permanent silence. But eight months later, when I finally had an address of my own in Rome and wrote to the post office asking them to divert the mail to it, I received a letter from a lawyer telling me that she, too, was dead of a stroke. The funeral was over. He assured me it had been a dignified affair, and he had looked after the funeral costs and would forward the ‘remaining’ inheritance, which he did. The last trace of him was his signature on a check for a scandalously modest amount that arrived just in time for my first Italian Christmas.
“But that morning in Cherbourg, with the sea wind stabbing my ears and the strap of my army surplus backpack already rubbing my shoulders raw, I set off on the first stage of what was to become a six-month two-thousand-mile meandering walk.
“It is hard to say now why I decided to walk. Part of the idea was to arrive in Rome, the inevitable destination in 1969 for an aspiring painter who preferred the classical style, with a certain sophistication of manner. I thought I would learn French by walking through France—and I was not entirely mistaken, though I learned far less than I hoped. I had read Baudelaire, Rimbaud, and Leonard Cohen. I wore my hair long and heeded the spiritual advice of psychedelic rock stars. And I wanted to take a long, slow walk away from Monica, Ireland, and my old self.
“I had a small tent. The tent had a small hole. It did not rain that night, but the wind whistled. I started walking in the wrong direction on a minor road that skirted the coast. I set up my tent in a plowed field, near a place named Cosqueville. All the villages there were named something-ville. I slept between the ridges of two furrows, and woke up half dead from cold, damp, and lumbago and raging with thirst. I had filled a water bottle in the toilets at the Cherbourg docks, and thought it would do me.
“I found the farmhouse. Or, better, as I drew near the farmhouse I was chased, caught, crowded, and cowed by a pack of dogs. I think I was crying when the farmer finally came out to shoot me dead with a very military-looking rifle.
“He looked at me, paying particular attention to my hair, then deciding that I was obviously some sort of bewildered half woman and posed no threat, sent me in to his wife. ‘Eau, eau,’ I kept saying. The farmer and his wife thought this was very funny. But they gave me water and milk and rolled-up buckwheat pancakes, and pointed me in the direction of Saint Lô, which they seemed to imagine was my ultimate destination, for who could go farther than that? Or maybe that’s what they thought I meant with my pathetic cries of ‘eau, eau?’.
“But night fell before I had even reached Carenten and I turned left by mistake and started heading back toward the sea. I had to pitch my leaky tent in another field, and lie there listening to the sea turning in its sleep, the slap and drag of rocks on a beach nearby, trying to imagine what warmth and Italy would be like. The rain came in slantways, and in the morning, the frost was so sharp and hard, I thought it would pierce my boots. It may have been the hunger, the cold or just the age I was, but that morning, in which I could have died from exposure, I felt brighter, more alive, and bristling with hope than I ever have since. I turned my back on the Atlantic and finally started walking inland, toward my future in Paris, Provence, Florence, and finally Rome with its ochre architecture, crumbling decay, and endless days of heat and sun.
“All this beautiful life lay before me.”
Caterina slept, her breathing regular, her mouth open in a tiny “o.”
He closed the book.
I owe a particular debt of gratitude to Cormac Deane for his structural and creative assistance, and to Ciaran Deane for psychological support, constructive criticism and encouragement. I could not have finished or even begun this without the love and patience of my family here in Rome. Thank you, Marion, for the regular phone calls and for hearing me out as I complained and updated in equal measure. My thanks also to Sarah Ballard, Michael Fishwick and Ben Adams.
I am indebted for certain technical aspects to Giuseppe De Rosa, whose website is to be found at
www.ilcollezionista.it
, as well as to Ispettore “Beppe”, Sovrintendente “Mimmo” and the excellent journalist Luca Pietrafesa.
Conor Fitzgerald has lived in Ireland, the UK, the United States, and Italy. He has worked as an arts editor produced a current affairs journal for foreign embassies and founded a successful translation company. He is married with two children and lives in Rome. The Fatal Touch is his second book.
The Dogs of Rome
First published in Great Britain 2011
Copyright © Conor Fitzgerald 2011
This electronic edition published 2011 by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
The right of Conor Fitzgerald to be identified as the author of this work has been
asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988
All rights reserved. You may not copy, distribute, transmit, reproduce or otherwise
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liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
Bloomsbury Publishing Plc, 36 Soho Square, London W1D 3QY
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN 978 1 4088 1718 6
www.bloomsbury.com/conorfitzgerald
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