So why did Professor Butler get Dock Time after Italy? Now it can be told. No, contrary to rumor, it had nothing to do with the adventures of Mr. Green, a mysterious figure who regaled the back of the bus with scandalous stories during a somewhat infamous ride back from a Tuscan winery. Mr. Green, we are informed, slipped back onto the ship in Civitavecchia and right out of this story. (Whew!) So what really happened that last night in port?

Who was that Mr. Green? Photo courtesy of R**n B*nb*ry

No one knows about the second great SAS Fall '99 rescue, not until now. But it's true! While Semester at Seapersons were making their way back to the ship in Civitavecchia the night of departure for Casablanca, Professor Butler was engaged in the heroic rescue of eminent SAS Professor X from certain death and inhumation in an ancient Etruscan tomb.

That last day in Civitavecchia, Professor X and I decided to go look at the Etruscan necropolis at Cerveteri, some twenty miles from the ship. On-ship time was 9 PM. It seemed straightforward enough--we'd gone to Tarquinia by public bus days before to see the tombs and wonderful Etruscan museum in that town. Cerveteri, however, is not so easy to get to. The local train stranded us some miles away from the hill town itself, requiring a cab. Not easy to find those either--this is apparently not on the usual tourist circuit. Eventually we were taken up into the town and dumped by the museum, the small sad remainder of an old Orsini castle above the town piazza.

After extracting whatever titillation the old pots in the museum afforded, we headed down to the piazza to find transport out to the necropolis, a few miles out of town. Walking would seem the obvious thing, but in Italy this is considered unthinkable, and it was still threatening rain. I was also concerned about Professor X who'd been dragging all day and seemed a-typically cranky. I must have been too--it had been a long voyage. We scrutinized bus routes, quizzed the local cop--a stunning young woman in a smart uniform and, more importantly, a car--but got nowhere. A bus existed on paper, but none of the bus drivers could remember one actually making that trip, and certainly not in early December. Now, I've been in town squares like this, having this very discussion, all over the world. The rule is that sooner or later someone will offer a ride. In Turkey I would have flagged a taxi, a truck, even a farm tractor. But here in Cerveteri on a dark December siesta no one was budging. So we hiked.

It was a beautiful walk, three miles maybe, and I'd recommend it to anyone. The little country lane snaked along a ridge out of town, past vineyards and their crumbly old villas. No cars, just a few tweedy types walking their dogs. Glimpses of the jagged volcanic Monti della Tolfa through the line of old umbrella pines. The road led only to the Etruscan tombs, some of which lay visible in the underbrush on either side. Professor X lagged farther and farther behind, taking innumerable slow photos and dreamy detours. I was anxious to see these tombs, but the afternoon got darker, the air wetter, the hour later, and I was getting exasperated. Whenever we got there we'd still be facing that long walk back to town, a drive to the train, a walk out the long Civitavecchia pier, and the 9 PM on-ship curfew. So I forged ahead, bought my ticket at the booth, and waited. And waited. Finally, Professor X appeared, clutching a handful of pine cones, with stories about the guys collecting pignola nuts down the road. Just buy the damned ticket, I thought, or we'll miss the ship and we'll all be picking pine nuts.

That's when the trouble began. Admission price was fairly steep, but there was a posted discount for senior citizens. The professor announced his-or-her venerable status and claimed the discount. Ticket lady, an old hag in black, was having none of it. "You're an American. That's only for EC senior citizens. Americans pay full price." "Outrage!" howled the professor, in Italian vocabulary gleaned from years of grand opera. "Besides, that's all the money I have left! Would you take my last lira? How will I ever get back?" She wasn't budging. So on they went, rehearsing their Cavalleria Rusticana, and I wanted to kill them both. Mortified and now desperate to bag some tombs, I turned my back and stormed off for the site. As I went out I heard the slam of a door back by the ticket booth. No one followed me in. Fine, I thought, Professor X has gone off to sulk.

The Etruscan necropolis here is a wonderful, haunted place, with dozens of deep dark tombs to explore along a mile-long ridge. Some are lit, most are not. All require strenuous exertion. At any point in the site one cannot see more than a few feet ahead, along the several winding paths. Tucked away at the far end I found the bookstore. Fascinating, but where was Professor X? Not a glimpse. Still annoyed, I assumed that he-or-she had been distracted by more pignola nuts, or wandered into some unlit back tomb to photograph something juicy. After an hour of high dudgeon, however, I was beginning to feel guilty about my own fit of pique, and not a little worried. Had they seen my friend at the bookstore? "Why yes, wearing a cap? Quite a while ago--perhaps your friend went back to the ticket booth?" So off I went to the ticket booth. The harpy was still there, no one else. "No, I don't remember!" she snapped. Neither did anyone at the little cafe outside. Uh oh...Back I went, trudging the entire length of the site, faster now, back to the bookstore, then hurried back again to the ticket booth. They were closing for the evening. It was getting dark.

At this point it was clear to me what had happened. Professor X, winded from the long walk, must have had an accident. Had had a stroke, fallen down the steep stairs, and was lying helpless at the bottom of one of these dozens of gloomy tombs. Omigod, it was all my fault! How could I have been so callous? What on earth to do now? I raised the alarm at the porter's lodge, pouring out my heart. "E molto vecchio!" I insisted, "and acting odd today. Who knows what may have happened?" My Italian was turning to gibberish, but they got the picture and reacted like heroes. In a scene straight out of Sherlock Holmes, we formed two search parties with lanterns, clambering down and amongst the many lit and unlit tombs. Nothing. What could I do? Should I leave now, bringing the awful news back to the ship? Stay and search till all hope was exhausted, missing departure? Did I even have the ship's phone number with me, and would it help? I knew from doing desk duty the day before that the cell phones were unreliable. "Mr MOB, Mr. MOB," kept running through my head. I want the captain to come rescue my friend!

Eventually, just as in that awful night on the Red Sea, a little voice announced the miracle. It was the sweet lady from the bookstore: "I drove down the road looking for Professor X. They tell me your friend was seen leaving the central piazza an hour ago on the bus down to the station!" She stuffed me into her little Fiat and off we roared to the train station, hoping to find the bewildered Professor X before any more harm ensued. And there on the platform was Professor X, looking fit and sound, sheepish but no more addled than usual. I shrieked, we hugged, and the bookstore lady wept. Just then the train rolled in, and off we went. I'm not making this up. What is it about Italy that makes opera seem real? Send in the clowns!

So how had Professor X eluded the positively Gothic death that seemed so certain an hour earlier? And why so sheepish now--hadn't I been the negligent party here, abandoning my companion in a fit of pique? Well... It seems that the eminent Professor X hadn't been lost at all, but had run away--on the lam from Italian justice. Hunh? Following the row with the ticket harpy, the outraged and now lire-less professor had struck back in a brazen act of civil disobedience. Seizing the sign that announced the senior-citizen discount, he-or-she scrawled EXCEPT AMERICANS! on the bottom, and was caught in the act by the harpy. Sure that she was summoning the carabinieri to make an arrest for defacement of government property and unruly behavior (in Italy?), the professor panicked and fled out the door. That was the slam I'd heard. Pursued by fears of booking, disgrace, and--worse--missing the ship's departure, he-or-she ran the whole length of the site, via the bookstore, and actually vaulted over the wall at the far end, gravely imperilling his-or-her testicles in the execution of this feat. Fled through the woods and ran all the way back to town. Not a word to me, of course. Destitute, the now-fugitive professor had to beg pocket change at a bar in the piazza for the bus fare down to the station, and thus was the biggest news in town by the time the bookstore lady arrived hunting for information. And hence the crazy scene on the train platform--me grovelling for forgiveness, Professor X hiding from cops, and the lovely bookstore lady baffled but thrilled, all singing as the curtain falls on Act II.

And the dock time? Well, in the final act of this opera buffa, our two principals have made it back to Civitavecchia on the train, both giddy, at the limits of physical exhaustion from all the chasing around. I was too relieved to be furious, and even refrained from pointing out that my fears for vecchio Professor X's mental faculties had proved better-founded than my concerns about physical stamina (though I've never since missed an opportunity to rub that in). Famished and parched, we gobbled a huge self-congratulatory seafood dinner in town (Prof. X's treat), staring numbly at Italian game show TV with the bored waiters. I think I inhaled a beer at the dockside bar. We limped and crawled up the gangway with minutes to spare, Professor X jubilant at having eluded Italian justice, me just dazed. An hour later my cabin phone rang. The Purser's Office politely pointed out that in all the excitement I'd neglected to turn in my passport on time. Four hours of dock time in Casablanca was the penalty--it seemed a small price to pay, all in all.

So why am I writing this now? Well, I've sworn to protect the dignity and anonymity of Professor X, who is still furious at being labelled molto vecchio in public. And so I shall. But I have my limits! Doesn't it seem unfair that after saving my colleague from joining the long-vanished Etruscans in their eternal gloom, or from Italian jail, or whatever, I should be the one to be humiliated with dock time? A man must clear his name and his sacred honor. And so it must be told.