Sheila Connolly - Reunion with Death (26 page)

Maybe the whiners and the divas had chosen to stay home. Did anyone acknowledge that she was a diva? High-maintenance? A pain in the ass? Wouldn’t you know by this point in your life?

Or maybe there were still women who didn’t feel complete without a man around, or who had become accustomed to letting a man take care of her. Maybe we were the most independent-minded women of our cohort. Whatever the reason, I liked these women. We were still smart, funny, interesting people. I wanted more and more to erase this stain from the holiday and send everyone home with happy memories.

“Your thoughts?” Cynthia asked as I was finishing my second cup of coffee.

I took a deep breath. “If we don’t come up with a name by tonight, I say we throw it on the table after the fun part of the banquet and see what happens.”

“God, that sounds like a recipe for chaos. Isn’t there a quieter way?”

“If you’ve got any ideas, now’s the time to lay them out,” I replied.

“I’ve got nothing,” Cynthia said. “We’re heading for some pretty serious caves at Carrara, aren’t we? Maybe we can take people into dark corners and force a confession out of … someone. Is anyone claustrophobic, do you know?”

“Not that I’ve heard. But nobody asked, just like nobody asked if we were afraid of heights. We are a fearless bunch, aren’t we?”

“That’s a fact. We even face weird food without flinching too. But back to basics: where are we supposed to find this bus for today?”

Connie spoke up. “I know the answer to this one! We go up the hill there and get into the vans, and the vans will drive us to the bus a mile or so farther up.”

“I bet this bus makes our drivers very happy. So, are we ready?”

“All set. Let’s get this show on the road.”

Chapter 23

The bus proved a happy surprise: plush seats, plenty of leg room, and a good view from the large windows. That last proved important, at least as we neared Carrara. The town—city?—itself looked modern and prosperous; the only peculiarity was the presence of marble sculptures on every other corner. It was kind of sweet—the Carrarans (Carrari?) certainly celebrated their local product. But we were never out of sight of the looming white mountains inland. We wove our way through commercial and residential streets, and then we began climbing. Again. The large bus went even more slowly than our vans had, despite an experienced hired driver, which gave us plenty of time to admire the vistas around every corner. However, the hairpin turns were scary, and not for the first time I hoped that we wouldn’t encounter anyone coming the other way. All the traffic seemed to consist of large, slow-moving flatbed trucks loaded with large chunks of marble.

By the time we were halfway up, I was saying “oh my God” about every fifty feet—and now it wasn’t from fear. We were in the heart of the mountains; even the gravel by the side of the road was made up of white marble chips. Looking up, the tops of the mountains were wreathed in cloud, and we were headed straight for them. In some ways it looked like a moonscape—certainly not like any mountain I’d ever seen, because it was nearly monochromatic. And all that white slag that had looked like snow from a distance spilled down the slopes and rested where it fell.

We were maybe two-thirds of the way to the top when the bus driver maneuvered the bus through a narrow driveway and into a parking lot. We tumbled out to find a scene with an air of unreality. There were sculptures in process; some men in masks were sanding and smoothing a few near a flimsy open shed. The workers were so covered with marble dust that they resembled statues themselves. Fragments of abandoned sculptures littered the surrounding ground as well—odd architectural bits and pieces, the occasional arm or foot, broken off or never finished. We humans in our brightly colored clothes looked out of place in this sere gray and white landscape.

There were also two bathrooms, so everybody took her turn. One never knows where the next one will be.

Finally Jane herded us toward another parking area, where there were some smaller vans (covered with white dust) waiting. Apparently we were going
into
the mountain, where we would get up close and personal with marble; we were going to follow in the footsteps of Michelangelo. If anyone had claustrophobia, now was the moment to declare it. Nobody did, or they didn’t admit to it: maybe curiosity outweighed panic.

We boarded the vans and headed into a dark, narrow tunnel leading straight into the heart of the mountain. A long, long way ahead we could see where the tunnel emerged on the other side, but we stopped in a large chamber an equal distance from each end. We had arrived.

We stumbled out of the small vans into a dark and dripping world. There were lights strung here and there but they cast huge shadows and left a lot of corners in darkness. A few pieces of large machinery lurked in the gloom, looking for all the world like mechanical dinosaurs, but nobody was using them at the moment. I wondered how much noise marble mining generated.

Once we had regrouped, we were ordered to put on hard hats—there was a long row of tables with various sizes of them waiting for us. We all spent a couple of minutes trying on different hard hats until everyone was satisfied, as though style mattered a thousand feet underground. But there would be pictures, so maybe it did. Then the tour guide, a young, plump woman, stepped up and spoke in accented English.

“You see where we come in? That is four hundred meters away—that is more than a thousand feet. The other end of the tunnel, the same. And the same again of marble below us, and the same above us. You are surrounded by the marble of the mountain.”

That was a startling statement. We were standing literally in the heart of the mountain, and the rest of the world was no more than a small square of light a very long way away.

She went on, about how the tunnels had first been built, about how the slabs of marble were cut and allowed to fall on giant pillows filled with marble dust (what else?), about the history of the families who had been carving marble for generation upon generation, even about safety regulations. A lot I tuned out, more fascinated by our unlikely situation. The scale of the space was so unreal, and we humans seemed so small in the midst of it. It was hard to estimate how far above our heads the “ceiling” was. It was even harder to imagine what cutting a multi-ton slab and detaching it from its matrix would be like. How did the workers stand it? I noticed that most of our group was equally distracted, staring up and around, walking through puddles underfoot without even noticing. Good thing there wasn’t going to be a pop quiz at the end of the tour, because I was pretty sure we’d all fail it. There was simply too much else to absorb.

We must have spent half an hour inside, poking into dark corners, before we trooped back to the vans. On the way out I snagged a seat next to the tour guide.

“How did they get the stone out of the caves and down the mountain back before there were trains and trucks?” I asked.

“They would slide them. With lots of soap. And many men to hold them back with ropes.”

Of course. Giant marble sleds. I wondered how often they had broken loose. How had they warned the people waiting below?

When we had all returned to daylight, we made a beeline for the gift shop. It was funny to see everyone arguing over which piece or pieces of marble—in the form of coasters, statuettes, boxes and so on—to haul home with them, but I understood the desire. I knew I felt different after spending time inside the marble, and I wanted to bring home a keepsake. The matching salt and pepper shakers didn’t weigh
that
much, and I would remember the experience every time I sprinkled salt on something.

The next stop was obvious: it was time for lunch. We dutifully boarded the bus and started the tortuous trek down the mountain. We could see huge holes punched in the sides of all the slopes, quarries that had been operating forever and were still going strong. How long would it take the world to run out of Carrara marble? It didn’t look as though it would happen any time soon.

In a strange way it was a relief to be back on flat ground, in the middle of the modern world, although the mountains still loomed around us. The bus driver let us out next to a small park and we headed to a brightly lit restaurant a block away—which our group filled entirely. I found myself sitting with more people I hadn’t had time to have a real conversation with, but then the food started arriving and I shut the door on conversing to concentrate on what was in front of me. There was no way to speak privately in this melee, and I wanted to give the food the attention it was due.

Where were the restaurants like this back home? I had to admit I didn’t go out much. I didn’t really enjoy dining alone, no matter how good the food, and since my daughter had moved away there really wasn’t anyone in my life I could call on the spur of the moment and suggest going out to eat. All right, here the company made a real difference: I was enjoying being part of a roomful of women who were smart and interesting, and who loved to talk and eat, often at the same time. I had never thought of myself as a “joiner,” but maybe it was time to reconsider my position. Or maybe it was time to sit back and enjoy the moment—and eat yet another fantastic multicourse meal.

I turned to the person next to me, someone whose name, Edith, I recognized vaguely from my short-lived foray into the sciences. She was Asian, and back in my college days the Asian women taking biology and chemistry classes were notorious for skewing the curves for the rest of us, who were struggling with those subjects most of the time. I wasn’t sure if that group had made many friends, in or out of class—they seemed always to be studying. I was curious to learn about how her life had turned out, and we chatted through a couple of courses. She had indeed become a doctor, married another doctor, was still practicing medicine, had traveled widely and lived abroad, and had led an altogether admirable life. I in return felt I had to apologize for abandoning my once-beloved major and taking on more prosaic work, which I couldn’t talk about in any detail anyway. But she wasn’t judgmental, and by and large we had a cheerful conversation.

My ears pricked up when I heard the word “professor” from someone at the far end of the table, and I tuned in to that conversation.

“Too bad he had to die while we were there,” someone said. I couldn’t see her face from where I sat.

“I’m surprised someone hadn’t offed him years ago,” Dorothy said with surprising frankness. “You know, at the last Alumnae Council meeting, I ended up talking to someone who must have been twenty years behind us, and she said even then he was still up to his old tricks.”

“That’s disgusting,” I heard another voice respond. “Why didn’t anyone ever say anything?”

“Well, in our day we were taught not to make waves, right?” Dorothy replied. “We were the ‘nice’ girls. End of an era, maybe. I’m sure nobody would put up with that kind of nonsense today.”

“Let’s hope not. Wonder if there’s anything in his file about all that?”

“I wonder how the college will handle his obit,” Pat said. “Can’t you see them dancing around all this? ‘Professor Gilbert was truly involved with his students, blah blah blah.’”

The speakers laughed and went on to talk of other things. Had everybody on campus except me known about his activities? What else had I missed? I remembered a solar eclipse one year, and the student strike. But lecherous faculty? Not on my radar.

I sighed and went back to my excellent food.

It was well past two when Jane stood up again. “I hope you’ve all enjoyed this wonderful meal”—enthusiastic clapping from all—“but we have one more stop to make before we return to Monterosso for our final banquet: the ruins of the Roman port town of Luna, where all that marble you saw today was shipped out to the rest of the world. The town was built in the second century BC and thrived for several centuries. Now it’s one of the most important archeological sites in the region. As you will see, it’s currently under excavation. And it’s spread out over several acres, so you can walk off your lunches!”

Once again we hauled our derrieres out of our seats and set off to find our bus. This time the drive was relatively short, although it took us well out into the countryside, which was quite lovely, with or without historic ruins. Odd how quickly we went from a bustling modern city to the ancient past. To reach the small museum slash ticket desk, we strolled some distance from the parking lot, stopping to admire a handsome flock of black sheep, each equipped with a low-toned bell. When they rang in unison as the flock moved, it was both musical and moving, and I wondered for the first time if my point-and-shoot camera could handle a video with sound. I hoped someone would capture it.

The museum came complete with a couple of cats sunning themselves on the steps—another thing I loved about Italy. This late in the day we were the only visitors. We acquired a tall, distinguished tour guide and set off across the meadows to stare at the foundations of a forum, shops, houses, fragments of the Aurelian Road and the city drain, while listening to the learned guide explain it all. I found if I paid attention I could pretty much understand what he said; my art-historical Italian was still useful. We made a circuit of what would have been the city walls, then headed farther out to the remains of the amphitheater, which, we were informed, could have held the entire population of the town with room to spare.

Once there I peeled off from the crowd and wandered on my own around the outer aisle of the amphitheater, trying to imagine it packed with thousands of cheering people. I found a convenient portion of wall and sat down, just absorbing the ambience, but I wasn’t surprised when Cynthia joined me.

“Anything new?” she asked.

“Not really, except I have yet to find anyone who liked the professor or wants to defend his memory. Sad, isn’t it? On the surface he was eminently respected, but under it all …”

“I know what you mean. So we haven’t proved a damn thing.”

“Nope, apparently not. What if we did manage to talk to everyone, and then cross-checked every blinking fact with every other, and we came up with no one at all in that intersection of those circles of yours? If they all alibied out?”