«Please, take a seat, I am Aurora Della Rosa, and I live in this humble home. I’m sorry, I still have to recover from the fright! I was afraid that everything could get on fire here tonight. Inside this house I have many books and manuscripts, very old ones, some even unique in the world, and in addition to my safety, I feared a lot of losing everything in the flames.»
We sat in a square room, where I noticed shelves full of books and scrolls. An entire wall was occupied by a mirror and the floor was in polished marble of various colors which, like a mosaic, represented a pentacle. I could not believe my eyes. I found summarized all that I had studied on esotericism and sects.
«Della Rosa,» I said, repeating her surname. «De La Rose was the name of a French house of famous Templars, the guardian knights of the temple and the Holy Grail.»
«It is said that they existed since before the advent of Christianity. The Templars were the custodians of Solomon’s temple in Jerusalem, the temple of whose ruins only the Wailing Wall remains, sacred to the Jews. Then they identified them as the custodians of the Holy Sepulcher. In the Middle Ages, in France, they were declared heretics, perhaps because it was thought that they kept the Holy Grail hidden and did not allow even the Pope to access to its hiding place, or perhaps because they were aware of important secrets that the Church did not want to be made public. They were tortured, many burned alive, but were never completely annihilated. Yes, you are right, my family is originally from France, from the Avignon area. The De La Rose, who had possessions in those places, fought against the British in the Hundred Years War, suffering many losses. At the end of the fourteenth century, some members of the family settled in this border area between Italy and France, a quiet place in the middle of the mountains. But then it seems that the Inquisition, even here, did not give respite to an ancestor of mine, who in the late sixteenth century was tried on charges of witchcraft.»
As she spoke, she pulled a silver cigarette case out of her kimono pocket, inside which were placed cigarettes that looked like they were rolled by hand. She chose one, brought it to her mouth, and held out the cigarette case towards us.
«Thanks, but I don’t smoke,» I said. «And I would be grateful if you refrained from doing so. Smoking bothers me.»
Without even considering what I had said, she lit her cigarette, directing the first dense cloud of smoke towards me, almost as a challenge. I don’t know how I did manage to hold back my anger, but I did.
«No more chatting, Aurora Della Rosa! Where were you last night when the fire broke out?»
She inhaled again and responded by emitting smoke along with the words.
«Last night I went to dinner in a restaurant downstream, “Da Luigi”. I didn’t feel like cooking, so I went out. I was on my way back when I saw the flash of the fire and called the police myself.»
«We will verify what you are saying. And, tell me, I guess you receive your customers here at home. They told me that you are a sorceress. People from everywhere and of all backgrounds come here, to ask for advice, buy potions, and so on. Judging by your car, it is a job that pays off. I don’t want to express my opinion on your work, I just want to ask you if you have received a particular client, a woman, recently, who could be the victim whose body we found.»
«My God,» Aurora exclaimed, surprised. «There was a victim? Who could have been in the woods at that hour of the night?»
«We hoped that you would tell us that! Come on, make an effort, I don’t think it’s that difficult.»
Thoughtfully, she inhaled other smoke.
«Whatever you think of my job, Doctor...?
«Ruggeri, Caterina Ruggeri.»
She blew another cloud of smoke in my direction.
«You see, the work that we sorcerers do is very respectable. I pay my taxes and I also joined the union of sorcerers, and I don’t sell smoke, like the one of this cigarette. People come because they trust me, and I also have to respect a code of ethics and protect my clients’ right to privacy.»
«Would you like to invoke professional secrecy, by chance?»
Carelessly, she turned off the cigarette butt in an ashtray and went on.
«I am not here to sell amulets or to deceive my customers about their possible future. I have good knowledge of herbal medicine and I know the issues that can be treated with medicinal herbs and those that must be dealt with in a conventional way. Many come here to ask for good advice and I bestow them, based on my science and experience. Nobody has ever complained about being deceived, I always say what my interlocutor expects, and everyone leaves happy and with an enriched heart.»
«Yes, but depleted in the wallet. Come on, I know your category well, you are able to make people believe that your deceptions are great remedies. I could agree on natural medicine, but on the rest...»
«Doctor Ruggeri, don’t be biased! We are all led to believe that what we see, and hear, and touch is the truth, that there is nothing but what is perceivable by our five senses, but sometimes it is not so. Inside this room, you can create optical and acoustic effects that make what is not seem true, and what is true seem false. Try to touch me, put a hand on my shoulder, and lean on me!»
I went over and tried to touch her, but my hand felt empty space where I saw her image.
«It’s a game of mirrors,» I said. «Some kind of a magician’s trick!»
«And now go to the center of the pentacle, on the central tile, and talk. You will hear your voice ring in your ears as if it came from a powerful stereo system.»
«Of course, it’s the effect of the room acoustics! It was the same in Roman amphitheaters. A matter of architecture! You’re going astray, trying to distract me from my goals. They told me that among your visitors, there is a particular category: the followers of a sect who recognize a saint in you. They come here to have access to your library and complete the process of achieving various levels of knowledge of the esoteric arts. Have you recently received any such visits?»
«The sect you speak of is the “Enomolas id ivres,” and it is not a satanic sect. Its adepts, through the various levels, assume knowledge unknown to ordinary mortals. For centuries, those who arrive here, or in three or four other places around the world similar to this one, aspire to achieve one of the highest levels of knowledge, the seventh. The path to reach it is very hard. For generations, my family has been the keeper of texts which can only be accessed by those who have completed the previous levels. Those who want to go further, to reach Universal Knowledge, must face the pilgrimage to the Temple of Knowledge and Regeneration, which is located in a remote valley between Nepal and Tibet. It is very difficult to reach the Temple.»
«I suppose you have already faced this pilgrimage, but that’s not what I want to know. I will repeat the question, have you received a visit from one of these followers in the last few days?»
«I have already told the policemen and carabinieri who interrogated me. The last visit of this type dates back to 1997, when a sorceress from a small town in Abruzzo, Sant’Egidio alla Val Vibrata came. She called herself Mariella La Rossa. She told me that before facing the tests that I would have subjected her to, she wanted to visit the magical places in the woods and around Triora, the Fontana di Campomavùe and Fontana della Noce, Via Dietro La Chiesa, and Lagu Degnu. It was the day of the summer solstice, one of the typical dates on which sorceresses and sorcerers meet, also in these places, for the Sabbath ritual. Mariella left at sunset and never returned.»
«And you certainly didn’t participate in the Sabbath and don’t even imagine what happened to Mariella! Come on, we know very