4732. It is in this sense that I have called the tourist
"you," and now that we know who he is, and why he exists, we will
talk a little about why he is in Naples. Fortunately he wrote down in a diary
an account of his trip to Naples, and his diary begins sometime previously, in
some late October, I do not know the year
4733. I do not know the man, and since it is a diary, and
diaries are always in the first person, we will have to dispense with his name.
I had expected to find a name, or at least a phone number on the flyleaf of the
book but there was nothing.
4734. The journal was left on a small table in a café in
Rome. I happened to sit down near the table and I was struck by what appeared
to be large leather, hand bound book, rather worn, with some discreet gold
edging on the binding. On the cover were some splatters of a dark red paint
almost like dried blood.
4735. It was an artist's journal, because the pages were unlined,
and the first fifteen pages had figure drawings in hard pencil. Whoever did the
drawings knew what he was doing. They were not perfect drawings, not the kind
you would expect of a modern day Ingres, but what the drawings lacked in
technical skill was made up by a tender affection.
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