The Gilded Madonna, Garrick Jones [best fiction novels txt] 📗

he did, he’d never be able to let me go.

I’d never been a romantic before I met him, except in the quietest times in the back of my mind. But since we’d got together, my tentative and awkward steps at showing affection had grown to unbridled passion and the deepest love imaginable.

On that day in the water, the seed of that passion had been planted, and here we were now, almost a year later, the tree of our lives spreading widely, covered in flowers and fruit and providing us both with everything either of us could ever need. This was my private thought, something I kept to myself. I doubted if I could even share such a sensitive thing with Harry—not yet, at least.

“Penny for your thoughts,” he said.

“Got any dirty pennies?” I replied.

“Funny, aren’t you, Smith.”

“I try, Harry. Actually I was thinking about Luka and Gălbenele.”

“How so?”

“Wondering why Dennis chose them.”

“Obviously to muddy the waters, to drive you crazy chasing after ghosts, Clyde.”

“But not all of them were ghosts, Harry, and the unexplained things Luka knew still keep me awake at night wondering.”

“Maybe one day you’ll just accept those things for what they are—questions for which there are no logical explanations. But I for one am grateful Dennis Kemeny’s madness made him seek them out, otherwise we’d never have met them. I think they’re both a very welcome addition to our little circle of friends.”

I was about to reply when something buzzed and a light came on over the door into the doctor’s office.

“Dr. De Natalis will see you now, Mr. Smith.”

“Good luck, Clyde.”

“See you on the other side, Harry.”

I didn’t care. I stood, picked up my hat and coat from the chair next to me, and bent down and kissed him.

“Buon giorno, Clyde,” the doctor said, holding her door open for me.

“Buon giorno, dottoressa.”

“Incominciamo?”

“Yes, let’s start,” I replied. “It’s time to get this show on the road.”

I glanced over my shoulder as I entered the room. Harry gave me a thumbs up.

“Now where shall we begin?” she said, once I’d taken a seat in an armchair. She sat opposite, a small table at her side.

“I don’t know,” I replied. “I’ve never been to a psychiatrist before.”

“Well, let’s play it by ear. You can talk in either English or Italian, some things might come easier in either language, so I’ll be led by you.”

“May I smoke?”

“But of course.”

I felt my hands trembling slightly as I lit my cigarette. I’d offered one to her, but she’d declined.

“Clyde, the first words are always the hardest for everyone. I’m not here to change you, I’m not here to re–order you mind. I’m a speaking mirror. I listen to what you have to say and I may ask questions to help you see your own reflection. It’s all up to you. Even if you want to sit here for an hour and not speak, that’s fine with me too. It’s your time to use as you wish.”

I laughed softly.

“What were you thinking when you just laughed like that?”

“I was wondering what I might have thought back in 1944, my last year as a prisoner in a German prisoner of war camp in occupied Italy, of sitting back here at home, thirteen years later on, with a successful business, living a comfortable life, and being in love for the first time in my life.”

“They were dark days, Clyde. You can tell me anything about them or nothing. Just know I lived through them myself. Despite the horror and the constant fear, like me, you must have had days, or even moments, when the sun shone and life was worth living.”

I closed my eyes, but as hard as I tried, I couldn’t actually place myself back in that dark hole. I could only imagine it, seeing myself as a third person. It was at that moment I realised that something had changed. I used to be almost overwhelmed with the same feelings I’d had while a prisoner. It had made me afraid to revisit that place in my mind because of the sudden unwelcome immersion. But now, instead of reliving any of it, I could only see myself through my mind’s eye, flying over the camp and through the squalor, untouched by it.

“I’ve changed, Doctor,” I said. “Those times seem like someone else’s life right now, when I tried to find one of those moments you just described.”

“You’ve already talked about four things that have changed you, Clyde.”

“I have?”

“Yes, you mentioned being back home, having a successful business, living a comfortable life, and being in love for the first time in your life.”

“Oh …”

“Yes, ‘oh’. This is what our process will be while we work together. The secret to fixing whatever you think is wrong with you does not lie in my hands, it’s something you already have the key to, Clyde. Now, let’s start off by talking about any one of those four things. It doesn’t matter which. You choose.”

Of course it mattered which. I knew it the moment she’d said it didn’t matter. But, before I could stop them, the words were out of my mouth.

“On the twenty–fourth of January last year, there was a knock at my front door. When I opened it a man was standing with his back to me with his hands in his pockets. He took off his straw Stetson and held out his hand. You must be Clyde Smith, he said. Sorry, was daydreaming. And, Doctor, I’m not making this up, but I promise you, my heart stopped in my chest …”

“Ah!” she said. “I think this is the very best place to start, Clyde. Don’t you?”

I think she was right.

AUTHOR BIO

From the outback to the opera.

After a thirty year career as a professional opera singer, performing as a soloist in opera houses and in concert halls all over the world, I took up a position as lecturer in music in Australia in 1999, at the Central Queensland Conservatorium of Music, which is now