In Roma at a Pizza Rustica

January 5, 1999  (I was 54) 

            In Roma at a Pizza Rustica standing in the plaza near

the Pantheon, I was jarred from behind by a large boisterous man.

I first thought he was pushing to get ahead in the crowd at the

service counter. He bumped me aside to reach over my shoulder to

the high counter and grabbed a butcher knife from the hand of the

attendant while shouting epithets I did not understand. The surprised

attendant shouted back.  I thought they knew one another and were

merely playing out a noisy charade.  it became evident this was not

the case when the knife-wielder charged angrily up the street to

threaten a man in a business suit who was conversing with two

others. 

            The pizza man darted around the stand in pursuit of the

assailant.  He intercepted the attacker from behind, clamping his arm

and wrist to wrest the blade away, while the would-be victims gaped in

astonishment.  Pizza man threw the large man down, shoving his face

to the street, bellowing a spitting rage all the while.  With a final smack

to the back of the man’s head, he picked up his knife and muttered his

way back to the stand brushing off the front of his apron.  The battered

big man staggered to his feet and into a narrow alley.  The businessmen

spoke animatedly, obviously with a change in the topic of conversation.

            Half a block away three uniformed police or carbonari conversed

in oblivious unconcern.  I looked at Cheryl as the confusion subsided. 

We realized the big man could have struck us had he chosen to do so.

Then remembering warnings of the diversionary tactics of pick-pockets,

we checked to find nothing missing. We proceeded to Palantine Hill and

the Coliseum where gladiatorial combat used to take place.