Stendhal's Syndrome, parts 4828 - 4831

4828. Being in the grip of my malady, I was unable to look at the art but wandered around looking at door casings, heat vents, ashtrays, countertops and also out of windows, where one could see a panorama of yet another wing of Termini filling up the entire skyline.

4829. I soon found myself outside the exhibition hall walking down a long corridor, but no one stopped me or turned me back. Along the corridor ran an outside covered portico. I went out on to it and found that it was a great porch of travertine marble stretching into the distance as far as I could see.

4830. I walked along this porch for a while and then I came across a man having a caffe' at a little table. It was Benito Mussolini.

4831. As soon as I saw him sitting there I knew that it was an aberration of my illness, just a hallucination, but he seemed so real, not like an apparition at all, and his manner was so hypnotic and compelling that I walked up to him and said, "Buon giorno."