Enchantment

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Enchantment Page 7

by Pietro Grossi


  At dawn, we stopped at the top of a knoll to see the red sun rising in the distance from the hills. The birds as usual were screaming like madmen, and a slight mist hung over the bottom of the valley.

  “It’s a really nice place,” I said, starting up the Vespa again.

  Half an hour later we stopped in a little village to have a quick bite to eat. We ordered two juices and two rolls. The thin, heavily made-up woman behind the counter asked us where we were from.

  “San Filippo,” Biagio replied, biting a chunk out of his roll.

  “San Filippo? Where’s that?”

  Biagio chewed his mouthful for a few moments. “Over that way,” he said, his mouth still half full, indicating some vague point outside the window with his chin.

  “Oh,” the woman said. She looked outside, lost in thought, and went back to cleaning something in the sink.

  When we paid and left, the woman wished us good luck, and, as we got back on the Vespa, to be on the safe side both Biagio and I passed our hands over the crotch of our trousers. A few kilometres further on, we stopped to refuel at a big Agip service station just outside yet another village.

  By day it was easier to drive around, and warmer, but also quite a bit more boring. After breakfast we simply rode for nearly two hours without saying anything. It was as if we’d entered a parallel zone, in which things happened by themselves, as with those mechanical cribs that Don Gianni set up every Christmas.

  It was always a great moment: against the walls of the church on either side of the only nave were two wide altars, each supported by a row of four little columns beneath which, if you moved far enough back, you could almost completely disappear. When Don Gianni set up the cribs, a whole queue of children would suddenly form in front of the door of the church at least half an hour before the mass. Don Gianni always called this a miracle, and one year launched into a particularly passionate homily in which, actually dabbing the corner of his eye with a handkerchief, he confessed how every Christmas he was astounded and dazed at the power of the love of Christ, who managed in the weeks of Advent to instil such devotion in children usually so casual.

  In reality, there was quite another reason for this sudden seasonal devotion: we had cut sections from a long brass pipe and Claudio provided the filling. Every figure knocked down in the crib was worth ten points, the shooting star five, the wise men fifteen and Joseph or Mary twenty. Whoever managed to get the baby Jesus, a feat only possible with a complicated blind shot—from beneath the altar opposite he could barely be seen, and you couldn’t take direct aim at him—automatically won the day. The prizes changed from one Sunday to the next, but for the baby Jesus, after a bit of insistence, Marta allowed the winner to get a look inside her knickers, and if he was lucky, maybe even a feel.

  It was a carabinieri car that brought us back to reality. When I saw that signal paddle waving and the carabiniere take two steps towards the middle of the road and motion us to pull over, I wasn’t even sure any more that Biagio was alive.

  The carabiniere who stopped us had a thin black moustache and sharp eyebrows. “Papers,” he said.

  Biagio and I hesitated for a moment or two, then put our hands in our pockets, and held out our identity cards.

  “And for this?” the carabiniere said, indicating the Vespa with his chin.

  Biagio looked at him, then to my great surprise put his hand back in his pocket and took out a blue plastic envelope. The carabiniere took it and went to his partner. We watched him as he copied something from our documents into a large notebook. They used the boot of the car as a desk and from time to time said something to each other. Then the carabiniere who had stopped us finished writing, talked in a low voice for a moment to the other one and came back towards us.

  “Where’s this place you come from?”

  “A long way from here.”

  “How long?”

  “Quite long.”

  “How long?”

  “I don’t know, quite long. A few hours.”

  The carabiniere gave us back our papers, and as he studied us the other one came up behind him.

  “How many kilometres?”

  Biagio looked at him for a moment, then glanced at the clock. Vespas didn’t usually have them, but Martino had installed one. It was small and round.

  “Oh, I don’t know,” Biagio said. “A hundred and fifty.”

  “And you’ve done a hundred and fifty kilometres on this old wreck?”

  “Yes. Maybe more.”

  The carabiniere turned to say something to his companion, and was a bit startled to discover him already behind him. “He says they’ve come a hundred and fifty kilometres.”

  “Yes, I heard.”

  “Or even more,” Biagio said.

  “Or even more.”

  “Yes, I heard.”

  The first carabiniere looked at us for another moment. “And where are you going?”

  “To Mugello.”

  “Mugello?”

  “Yes, Mugello.”

  “To do what in Mugello?”

  “To ride a motorbike in the trials.”

  “To ride a motorbike?”

  “Yes, to ride a motorbike.”

  The first carabiniere turned his head slightly and exchanged glances with his partner, then turned back to us. “There are two of you.”

  Biagio turned his head slightly and threw me a puzzled glance. “Yes,” he said. “There are two of us.”

  “So what are you going to do?” Biagio was silent for a moment. “Well, there are two of you too.”

  “So what?”

  “We could play a game of bridge.”

  The second carabiniere, the one who was behind, laughed. But the first one just kept looking at us without moving. “Is it a good bike?”

  “Apparently,” Biagio said. “But I wouldn’t bet on it.”

  Even the first carabiniere couldn’t help smiling.

  “All right, you can go. And just hope that nobody else stops you.”

  “Thanks, Captain,” Biagio said, then hit the pedal and sped off before they could have second thoughts.

  As we were riding away, I turned and threw a glance at the carabinieri: they were standing there watching us leave, shaking their heads slightly, but with half-smiles on their lips, and I’m convinced that part of them would have liked to have been in our place.

  *

  Not long afterwards, having passed a dreary little village and a long tree-lined avenue, we saw a sign saying Florence. As I tried to guide Biagio in the right direction with the map in my hand, I kept looking around but I didn’t recognize anything of the Florence I had visited two years earlier on a school trip. Not a single sighting of anything resembling an old palace, not the slightest inkling of a bit of history: only a horrible spider’s web of wide avenues and apartment blocks and cars overtaking us and making us skid. In the middle of all that, the noise of the Vespa suddenly sounded like the crying of a baby. Fortunately, after a couple of halts to take a closer look at the map, I managed to find some secondary roads that took us back to the countryside and up a slope and through a wood.

  About an hour later, coming round yet another bend, I tapped Biagio on the shoulder.

  “We’re here,” I cried. “If I’m not mistaken, we’re in Mugello.”

  I continued looking at the map and the trees around us. They were no different from the trees we’d been seeing all along, but everything looked that bit darker and gloomier.

  “Really?”

  “Yes, really. Let’s stop and ask.”

  At the top of the rise there was a snack bar with wooden benches outside, and beyond the snack bar the road curved and again descended out of sight.

  Biagio put the Vespa on the kick-stand and stretched. “Jesus,” he said.

  It was hot and we both tied our jackets round our waists. We went into the snack bar, and a fat grey-haired man told us to take a seat. We ordered two more rolls. We felt tired and neither of us had the courag
e to ask for directions: by now we were convinced that nobody would be able to give us the slightest information and everybody would take us for madmen, and we would ride round and round like idiots for hours and even if we made it we would go back to the village shattered, with our tails between our legs. We sat there in silence taking chunks out of our rolls and chewing and every now and again sipping at the water.

  We’d paid and were at the door when I decided to take the initiative. “Listen,” I said, turning towards the fat grey-haired man. “Do you have any idea where they hold motorcycle trials?”

  He stopped cutting the bread and looked at me. “What?”

  “The circuit,” I said unconvincingly.

  “The circuit?” the host said again. “You’re on the circuit.”

  “I’m on it?”

  “Yes, the circuit used to pass this way. But what are you looking for?”

  I looked at him for a moment and felt more tired than ever. “I don’t know, I only know that the other day we were at the Rocky Road and this man in a raincoat showed up and asked Biagio if he wanted to ride a real one and Biagio said no and the man said, ‘Do what you like, but if you have second thoughts, there are trials at Mugello on Wednesday,’ and they said goodbye and then Biagio really did have second thoughts and I told him he was doing the right thing and so we asked Martino for his Vespa and we left at four o’clock this morning and came to Mugello but we don’t even know how big this damned Mugello is and we don’t even know where the trials are and Biagio didn’t want to call and now we don’t know where to go.”

  If it weren’t for the fact that every cell of my body had been struggling for the past few months now to become a man, I would certainly have burst out crying.

  The host had kept still all this time, listening to my monologue, his knife halfway through a slice of bread. “The race track,” he said.

  I looked at him and snorted. “Yes. The race track.”

  The host lowered his eyes and started cutting the bread again. “Straight ahead. Keep going down the road, stay on the left, and after three hundred metres you’ll see the signs. You can’t go wrong.”

  I watched him cutting his bread for a moment. “Thanks,” I said. “Have a good day.”

  “You’re welcome. Have a good day yourself.”

  As we were on our way out, Biagio gave a slightly bewildered look.

  “Straight ahead,” I said, getting back on the saddle.

  7

  WHEN WE GOT to the top of the hill and started the descent, Biagio slammed on the brakes as if an animal had crossed our path. The rear tyre squeaked for at least twenty metres and the Vespa veered slightly to the side.

  Beneath us on the left, beyond a high concrete wall and a thick metal fence was a long downhill bend, with red and yellow stripes on the inside and at a couple of points on the outside. In the distance we could see a few other stretches of the track, and farther down, a long, square, coloured building. At the end of our road, in the hollow, there was a massive gate, covered by a huge wooden roof.

  After a few seconds we saw something dark come round the bend, beyond the fence, screaming like a hyena and going like a bullet.

  “What was that, a bike?” I asked with a smile on my lips when that thing had disappeared again behind the wall.

  Biagio continued staring at the point from which it had disappeared. “Yes, I think it was.”

  For a few moments we kept looking at that stretch of black road half hidden by the wall.

  “I don’t know,” Biagio said at last, then got back into first gear and slowly descended towards the large gate with the wooden roof.

  A tall, thin man holding a radio came out of a small square hut. “It’s closed,” he said, holding his hand up.

  “What do you mean, ‘it’s closed’?”

  “Just that,” he said, jutting out his chin. “It’s closed.”

  “So what are you doing here?”

  He looked at us impatiently. “I’m here to say it’s closed.”

  “It doesn’t look closed.”

  “It’s closed to the public.”

  “Oh,” Biagio said. “We’re looking for the motorcycle trials.”

  “The trials are here.”

  “So it isn’t closed.”

  “Listen, what do you want?”

  “To ride in the trials.”

  “I said it’s closed.”

  “But didn’t you say the trials are here?” Biagio said, opening his arms wide in irritation.

  “Yes, that’s right, the trials are here.”

  “Well?”

  “Well what?”

  “I don’t understand any of this.” Biagio turned his head slightly towards me. “Can you talk to him, please?”

  “Listen,” I said, “we’ve come a long way because a man told us to come here today for the motorcycle trials, and the only place where they’re holding trials, so I’ve heard, is here.”

  “Yes, the trials are here.”

  “So it’s all right, then.”

  “No, it isn’t.”

  “Why?”

  “They aren’t public trials.”

  Biagio ran his hands through his hair. “Fuck this, I’m going crazy.”

  “But if someone told us to come…” I said.

  “And who was this man?”

  “How should I know? He was a man in a raincoat and a hat. I don’t remember his name.” Then I had a flash of inspiration. “He gave us a card!” I said excitedly. “Hey,” I tapped Biagio on the shoulder, “give him the card.”

  Biagio searched through his pockets, then finally brought out the card that the man on the Rocky Road had given him. It was all crumpled.

  The tall thin guard took the card and looked at it. His hands were rather funny: thin and knotty. He raised his eyes and looked at us, then lifted his other arm and brought the radio up to his mouth. “Hello.”

  “Go ahead,” the radio crackled after a moment.

  “I’m here at the entrance. There are two young guys with a card from Team Torcini.”

  “What about it?”

  “They say they’ve been invited to the trials.”

  The radio was silent for a moment or two.

  “I’ll check,” it finally crackled.

  The man lowered his arm and gave the card back to Biagio. “They’re going to check.”

  We nodded without saying anything, and Biagio put the card back in his pocket. We stayed like that for several minutes, without moving and without saying anything, looking away from each other.

  “Hello,” the radio crackled again.

  “Yes?” the man said, bringing it closer to his mouth.

  “Let them through.”

  “Okay.” The man looked at us and moved aside. “Go ahead,” he said. “Pit sixteen.”

  Biagio hit the pedal hard to start the Vespa again. “What?”

  “Pit sixteen.”

  “Oh,” Biagio said. “Thanks.” Then he got into first and set off.

  After a few hundred metres, coming out of a kind of tunnel, we saw a red iron fence with big gates in it. Behind the fence, on the left, there was a long square red and yellow building. In front of the building was a vast car park with some lorries covered in writing and a few vans. We went slowly through one of the gates. The sound of the Vespa seemed to drown in all that space. After a few metres we saw a young guy coming from behind one of the lorries wearing a shirt with the same colours and writing, but in miniature.

  “Excuse me,” I called to the young guy when we were almost level with him.

  Biagio stopped the Vespa and put one foot on the ground. “Do you know where pit sixteen is?”

  The young man looked at us and our Vespa, then smiled and shook his head. “Fifty metres on the left. You can see it—there’s the number.” He was already continuing on his way towards the square building.

  I took a good look at the building: every few metres there were huge red shutters with numbers on them, in asc
ending order.

  “Thank you,” I said.

  Then Biagio got back into first and at walking pace, trying not to look in the other doors, we rode towards number sixteen. He seemed intimidated and I knew him well enough to know that he was wondering what the hell he was doing here, in this place full of signs and colours, where everything seemed fake.

  Thinking about it now, I can’t help wondering if Biagio had realized something: if in some way the cells of his body had already sensed that he was coming to one of those moments when life takes an unexpected turn and you feel you’re losing control. I don’t know if I’ve ever really understood how these things work, but it’s as if, while your insides are pulling you one way or another just so as not to have to make a decision, you let the world drag you along. Then you always find something you weren’t expecting, and you wonder if, in the end, it’s true that the world knows more than you do.

  When we got to number sixteen, Biagio stopped the Vespa in front of it and put one foot on the ground. After a few moments, the man who had come to the Rocky Road appeared from the half-darkness of the entrance. He was in his shirtsleeves, no raincoat, no hat. He had short grey hair combed back, and his moustache, unshaded by any hat, looked bigger.

  “You’ve come,” he said with a half-smile as we came level with him.

 

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