THE BLACK HOODED MAN

THE BLACK HOODED MAN 

Beside another little cross Sol engraved (on the wall) : D.17, where D. meant December, but it would take too time to engrave all the letters ( the whole word). , not to mention that the letters were not only difficult to engrave, but it was also impossible to prevent them from being crooking, since the wall was quite hard and almost steep under the plaster.

The end of the year was approaching and all the signs she had carved in a corner inside the wall surrounding the garden referred to a presence that had been mentioned several times during the year which was going to end. On the occasion of tragic events, that is of crimes and strange suicides, both the newspapers and the televisions had talked about a black hooded man, who had been seen at the scene of the crime or the suicide . None of those who had said to have seen that man in black had seen his face. Some of those witnesses had said that even the face of the black hooded man was covered or masked. So not even an identikit had been made of this someone hooded in black, who remained a complete unknown, a kind of ghost or perhaps a curse, which had been seen wandering where misfortunes had occurred, where bloodshed had happened.

Since of a man with such look, hooded in black, had been talked for crime events that all had occurred in the territory of the same province, Sol, like many others, was led to believe that it was always the same person, that the hooded man in black was one and only one.

The last time they talked ( mentioned) a black hooded man, it was ( had been) precisely about the suicide of a little boy of 11 years, who had jumped out of the seventh floor window. The tragic event had occurred on December 17. The little boy was alone at home and, just before jumping out of the window, he had sent a message ( an E-mail) to his parents , in which he had written that the black hooded man was in front of him , and that he had to follow the black man.

From what newspapers and televisions were saying, it seemed that everyone thought that the black hooded man who(m) the little boy had mentioned ( had written) , was not a real presence, or a real man, but only….an image, that is someone who had been ( was) in contact with the child via chat, that, in short, the poor little boy did not have had in front ( of him) a real man, of flesh and blood, all dressed in black, but instead the man hooded in black of whom the teenager had written ( who had mentioned) was someone, perhaps masked, who had appeared on the computer screen to the little boy( who the L. b. had seen only on_____) Sure, it might had been that way, but Sol, minded of the other previous times when it had been talked of the presence of the (a) black hooded man, was led to think that the poor child flew out of the window, had really had been facing the black hooded man, a man in flesh and in blood.

There were five other signs Sol had engraved on that corner of the garden wall, each if which stood for the date of a murder or (of) an almost strange suicide, that is a suicide which aroused many suspicions.( The culprit of the_____HOW MANY_____murders  had not been found) For none of the _____murders the culpriy had been found, even if the husband of a victim had been had been suspected and investigated for one of them. Who too had said he had seen a black hooded man running away from home, where the crime had happened, the night when his wife  had been killed. The woman had been slaughtered in her house kitchen. Not only that, some neighbors of the victim had said they also had seen a hooded man all dressed in black wandering

Around there in the days before the murder.

Sometimes it happened to Sol to think, to wonder if that black hooded man , of whom not a few people had talked, affirming to have seen him, but all those who had seen him were not able to say what his face was ( he had), since they had not seen his face, here, it came to wonder to her if that unknown man in black, instead of a real man, could not be a sort of projection , that several people had in common, a projection of their own guilt , or of their feeling guilty. The black hooded man could also be ( have been) the materialization, or indeed the representation of their being guilty, of the guilty of each of them, who claimed to have seen him.

However, both when she thought that the black hooded man was a real man, someone really existent, who had been present when the little boy of eleven years had thrown himself out o the window, and she came to think, but indeed to see him , the man all in black, who had thrown the child out of the window, not only had induced him to jump out of the window, and also when instead it seemed to her that  black presence could only be a projection, a representation, an image of the evil, of human evil and wickedness, for Sol the black hooded man remained a threatening presence, always lurking, always ready to strike.

Then days had already passed since the last date which Sol had marked on the wall, perhaps for the current year that would have been the last time the unknowable hooded in black would have appeared, Sol said to herself, looking at the signs engraved  on that angle of the wall, regarding which only she could understand the days indicated by those abbreviations, only she could understand what the signs, or the acronyms, which stood for those days, refer to. Yet , while she said this to herself, she felt that it would not be so. Not simply that there was a possibility, or danger, that it wasn’t, but that it really wouldn’t , in fact, like that. The hooded man in black would strike again ( would have______) before the year was over.

The end of the year was approaching and Sol , in the very last days of the year, always had the feeling not only that time was accelerating, that it started to run, but even that time started to fly, to fly away very fast.

Among the dates she had marked on the wall three others, in addition to the last, concerned to strange suicides, which all had happened with ( through) a flight from a considerable height, two with a flight from a window, one with a flight from a roof. .

Sol couldn’t know why those suicides, where it had happened that someone had jumped himself from a considerable height  , made her think of that feeling, returning for her every year, in the last days of the year, that time started running, or rather flying away very fast.   Perhaps because for those who commit suicide by jumping down from above, the time of the flight, the time between when he jumps out of the window , or of the roof, and when he arrives on the ground, must be a very short time, which flies away in a moment.

A rosemary plant grew luxuriantly, spreading a deliciously pungent smell all around, in front of the corner of the wall on which Sol had engraved the signs indicating the days, the dates of the….apparition of the black hooded man. They say that rosemary helps to recall forgotten events, and forgotten persons, and forgotten things, but only if they are such that it is necessary, indispensable to remember.

On the piece of meadow with the rosemary plant there were often little birds, sparrows, bullfinches, goldfinches scrolling, with their little steps in hopping, and they were pecking quickly quickly, shaking their heads, they all ready to fly away , as soon as Dominique, her cat came silently, advancing with its very soft steps. Also those little birds , which suddenly took off in flight and flew away ,ade Sol think of THE FLIGHT OF THE TIME.

January 19 was the first date she had marked, shorting it, on the wall. It was the day when, at seven in the evening, a young Pole, who had been traveling for months in (through) Europe, threw himself out of a window  on the fifth floor of a hotel in the provincial capital city. And then all people, newspapers, televisions had been wondering why that  twenty yeas old man , from Krakov, had chosen precisely that wonderful city of art to put end to his life. The newspapers and the media had talked about drugs, about bad encounters that the young Pole would have had in the wonderful city where his life had ended. And that was when they had forst spoken about him, about the black hooded man, whose entrance in the scene had happened that day. There were witnesses who claimed to have seen the man all in black go out of the room pf the young man after he had jumped ouy of the window, , and those who claimed to have seen the man in black enter the young Pole’s hotel room before he fell to the ground, though the window, in his fatal and final flight. And again Sol came to think of the flight of the time. The flight of the time and the flight out of a window seemed to her to resemble each other, there was something substantially identical in both. Of course if you see the slow motion shooting images of a free fall , the time of that flight gives you the feeling of being, indeed of being able to be, endless, just as time is endless, even when it, accelerating and flying away, seems to be going to end, Sol thought, as the time of the year, day after day, was running out.

It was two days before the end of the year, and the black hooded man had not reappeared , when, while she was returning home, a massive black hooded man, who was walking with his head low( lowering his head), as if he wanted to hide his face, had suddenly appeared before her on the sidewalk , and she couldn’t realize from where he had come out. She had quickened her step, trying to overtake him, to be able to see his face, but when she was going to overtake him_____she was now by his side___the man all in black had turned abruptly, heading very fast towards the entrance of a building where there were many apartments. Sol had remained staring at that door , which had only opened for a moment, to let the man in black come in, and immediately it had closed behind him, while she, keeping on looking astonished at that door, was feeling in her throat the rumbling of the beatings of her heart, which had started running as the time when it is flying away, when it is going to end. In those moments she had been sure that the black hooded man had just made his reappearance , and that right she would have been the last victim of that unknown in black in that year which was going to end.

Sol ran home, rushed in the garden and, armed withj an awl and hammer , began engraving the abbreviated date, December 29, on the wall, that day was the last time the nefarious black hooded man had appeared. She felt her heart trembling, as she was engraving those marks. Of course  this time it was more difficult, more tiring than ever to do it, since she knew that what she was engraving on the wall would also be the date of her death. ( OR____would also have been)

There was a big black bird , which she had never seen before, on the meadow on which the rosemary plant stood. The black bird had something sinister ( devil), it was making dull chirps , which sounded as an announcement of an impending doom. Ah, how much Sol would have liked Dominique ( to) come and put that bad omen to flight. But her cat didn’t appear, instead she heard his moaning meows, like the cat was asking for help. In fact Dominique had remained locked in the underground. Her cat had continued to meow, making wide mouthed meows, big meows of despair and even of angry, even after she had freed him. And Dominique meowing, had kept on beating his paws on her hands, while she , trying to calm him , asking and again asking:  “ “What is it, Dominique? What do you want to tell me, my honey?” It seemed that her cat wanted to warn her of an imminent danger. Oh, it was a real treasure Dominique, she was moved by he was trying to save her, but it was useless now, it was too late. She knew that she would be the next victim of the black hooded man. She had already engraved the date on the wall. Now she had no escape. Without knowing why, she nevertheless felt a certain relief, a considerable comfort at the thought that she yet had managed to mark on the wall, as a stop in time, the date of the last coming in action of the terrible hooded in black, the day when he would hit again. ( OR: would have_____), and this time just she was ( would be) the victim.  For Sol it was as if the black man had already killed her or caused her death. Her certainty did not  waver even when the day___it was December 29_____ended and she had to acknowledge ( admit) that she was still alive. Then she thought that, oh, it meant that there had been, for some reason, a delay, which could only be short, given that the year was about to end.  The following day, the 30^th of December, passed and she remained alive. It will be for tomorrow, she said herself on the evening of December 30. And she even felt a little of irritation, of disappointment because (since) oh, too bad, the last date she had already marked on the wall would not exactly correspond ( would not have______)to when the imminent crime of the hooded man in black would have happened.

The last day of the year arrived  and Sol was still alive- Ah, he, the black hooded man, must have decided to reserve his last crime in this year for the very last day ( of the year), she said herself, waiting for the inevitable fulfillment of her destiny.  The day passed and she remained alive- Her cat kept on wagging his tail around her, meowing very cheerful. Even that day he seemed to have something to say her, but something that made him happy.

When Sol went to the wall on which she had engraved the dates indicating the presence of the black hooded man, she saw that they were all gone.  Even the late date.