As they were looking forthe sergeant, a lady arrived, declaring herself an animal lover. Ihave six cats, she said. This is a dog, not a cat, Belbo said, andhe's dying, and I'm in a hurry. Cat or dog, you should have aheart, the lady said. No sergeant. Somebody must be brought fromthe SPCA, or from the hospital in-the next town. Maybe the animalcan be saved.
The sun was beating downon Belbo, on Lorenza, on the car, on the dog, and on thebystanders; it seemed to have no intention of setting. BeJbo feltas if he were in his pajamas but unable to wake up; the lady wasimplacable, the sergeant couldn't be found, the dog went onbleeding and panting and making weak noises. He's whimpering, Belbosaid, and then, with Eliotlike detachment: He's ending with awhimper. Of course he's whimpering, the lady said; he's suffering,poor darling, and why couldn't you look where you weregoing?
The village underwent ademographic boom; Belbo, Lorenza, and the dog had become theentertainment of that gloomy Sunday. A little girl with anice-cream cone came over and asked if they were the people from theTV who were organizing the Miss Ligurian Apennine contest. Belbotold her to beat it or he'd do to her what he did to the dog. Thegirl started crying. The local doctor arrived, said the girl washis daughter, and Belbo didn't realize to whom he was talking. In arapid exchange of apologies and introductions, it transpired thatthe physician had published a Diary of a Village Doctor with thefamous Manutius Press in Milan. Belbo incautiously said that he wasmagna pars of that press. The doctor insisted that he and Lorenzastay for supper. Lorenza fumed, nudged Belbo: Now we'll end up inthe papers, the diabolical lovers. Couldn't you keep your mouthshut?
The sun still beat downas the church bell rang compline. We're in Ultima Thule, Belbomuttered through clenched teeth: sun six months of the year, frommidnight to midnight, and I ¡¥m out of cigarettes. The dog confineditself to suffering, and nobody paid it any further attention.Lorenza said she was having an asthma attack. Belbo was sure by nowthat the cosmos was a practical joke of the Demiurge. Finally itoccurred to him that they could take the car and look for help inthe nearest town. The animal-loving lady agreed: they should go,they should hurry, she trusted a gentleman from a publishing housethat published poetry, she herself was a great admirer of KhalilGibran.
Belbo drove off and,when they reached the nearest town, cynically drove through it, asLorenza cursed all the animals with which the Lord had befouled theearth from the first through the fifth day. Belbo agreed, and wentso far as to curse the work of the sixth day, too, and perhaps alsothe rest on the seventh, because this was the most ill-starredSunday he had ever lived through.
They began to cross theApennines. On the map it looked easy, but it took them hours. Theydidn't stop at Bobbio, and toward evening they arrived at Piacenza.Belbo was tired, but at least he could have supper with Lorenza. Hetook a double room in the only available hotel, near the station.When they went upstairs, Lorenza said she wouldn't sleep in such aplace. Belbo said they'd look for something else, if she would justgive him time to go down to the bar and have a martini. He foundnothing but cognac, domestic. When he went back up to the room,Lorenza wasn't there. At the front desk he found a message:"Darling, I've discovered a marvelous train for Milan. I'm leaving.See you next week."
Belbo rushed to thestation: the track was empty. Just like a Western.
He had to spend thenight in Piacenza. He looked for a paperback thriller, but thestation newsstand was closed. All he could find in the hotel was aTouring Club magazine.
It had an article onApennine passes like the one he had just crossed. In hismemory¡Xfaded, as if the day's events had happened long ago¡Xtheywere arid, sun-baked, dusty, scattered with mineral flotsam. But onthe glossy pages of the magazine they were dream country, to returnto even on foot, to be savored step by step. The Samoas of SevenSeas Jim.
How can a man rush tohis own destruction simply because he runs over a dog? Yet that'show it was. That night in Piacenza, Belbo decided to withdraw oncemore into the Plan, where he would suffer no more defeats, becausethere he was the one who decided who, how, and when.
That must also have beenthe night he decided to avenge himself on Aglie,,even if he didn'thave a clear reason. He would put him into the Plan without Aglie'sknowing. It was typical of Belbo to seek revenges of which he wouldbe the only witness. Not out of modesty, but because he distrustedthe ability of others to appreciate them. Slipped into the Plan,Aglie would be annulled, would dissolve in smoke like the wick of acandle. Unreal as the Templars of Provins, the Rosicrucians: asunreal as Belbo himself.
It shouldn't bedifficult, Belbo thought. We've cut Bacon and Napoleon down tosize: why not Aglie? We'll send him out looking for the map, too. Ifreed myself of Ardenti and his memory by putting him into afiction better than his own. The same will happen withAglie.
I believe he reallybelieved this; such is the power of frustrated desire. The fileended¡Xit could not have been otherwise¡Xwith the quotationrequired of all those whom life has defeated: Bin ich einGott?
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What is the hiddeninfluence behind the press, behind all the subversive movementsgoing on around us? Are there several Powers at work? Or is thereone Power, one invisible group directing all the rest¡Xthe circleof the real Initiates!
¡XNesta Webster, SecretSocieties and Subversive Movements, London, Boswell, 1924,p.348
Maybe he would haveforgotten his decision. Maybe it would have been enough for himjust to write it. Maybe, if he had seen Lorenza again at once, hewould have been caught up by desire, and desire would have
