The Tuscan Contessa

by Dinah Jefferies

  When he walked in, she instantly recognized the solidly built man with a kind face. She rose from her seat and they shook hands.

  ‘Thank you for meeting me,’ she said.

  ‘It is my pleasure. I remember you well. How is your husband?’

  ‘He’s in Rome at present.’ She fudged her reply as she didn’t actually know where, or how, Lorenzo currently was.

  ‘Still at the ministry?’

  She nodded.

  ‘So.’ He clasped his hands together, fingers pointing upwards. ‘What can I do for you?’

  ‘Well, I’m not really sure. I expect you know how concerned we are to avoid damage here in Florence.’

  ‘Well, yes, of course, but obviously …’ He paused and smiled sympathetically. ‘I have no influence over the Allied bombing.’

  She smiled back. ‘True. I hope you don’t mind me mentioning it but people are saying you have been instrumental in preserving or should I say protecting artworks from being removed from Italy.’

  He glanced around the room to check if anyone was in earshot. ‘My dear lady, you must understand I cannot comment. I am a German citizen and, as such, of course I support my country in winning this war.’

  ‘I understand.’

  She thought for a moment before trying a different tack. ‘We’ve heard that when the German army retreats, they tend to leave destruction behind them. Is that correct?’

  He gazed at the table for a few moments, then looked up at her, sadness in his kind eyes. ‘It is to be deeply regretted … Look, Contessa, I am only talking with you now because of my previous friendship with Lorenzo.’

  She nodded.

  ‘Florence, as you know, was a city of wealthy bankers and merchants in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. They spent their great wealth on extraordinary architecture and filled their palaces with fine art and wonderful frescoes. How can any thinking man bear to see it destroyed?’

  She shook her head.

  ‘I tell you that because I am trying to retain my humanity at an extremely testing time. I do my best to alleviate suffering if it is in my power, and I aim to preserve whatever I can of the majesty of Florence. I do not wish the world to lose what you have here.’

  ‘Of course. And I imagine you are not party to Kesselring’s intentions?’

  He shrugged and looked up at the ceiling. She waited, anxiously watching the internal struggle reflected in Wolf’s face, his jaw pulsing and signs of tension showing in his brow. She could tell he would have liked to say more and felt sorry for putting him in a quandary.

  Eventually he sighed and looked at her again. ‘Although Kesselring is a genial man, my powers, as far as our Commander-in-chief is concerned, are extremely limited. And now I’m afraid you must excuse me.’

  He rose to his feet and shook her hand before leaving.

  31.

  They set off from Montepulciano at five in the morning to avoid the Allied bombing. Maxine sat with Major Gustav Bruckner in the back of the chauffeur-driven car. On their third meeting, he’d offered to give her a lift to Florence and, of course, she’d swiftly accepted. She gazed out at the barren landscape and longed for the fresh lemony light of a spring morning.

  Captain Vogler was sitting morosely in the front passenger seat and not adding a word to the already limited conversation. Bruckner patted Maxine’s knee but, although obviously attracted to her, he had been in no rush to do more. They’d mainly spent their time engrossed in lively talk, which is why she found this silence unsettling. If anything was wrong, she could hardly make a dash from a car occupied by three Germans.

  She considered the things Bruckner had revealed about himself. Unmarried, he did not have a fiancée or steady girlfriend back home. Although he intended to finish his medical training once they won the war, he had no interest in settling down. He wanted to travel. In Germany he’d ridden a motorcycle, which he preferred to driving an automobile. He enjoyed reading and the theatre, but most of all he loved opera. In short, he was a cultured man. If he hadn’t been the enemy, she could have really liked him. In fact, she did like him and had to remind herself he was also a ruthless SS officer.

  But everybody had different, maybe even conflicting aspects to their character. She certainly had. When her mother, Luisa, had persisted in urging her to marry the grocer, she’d defiantly retorted, ‘No. I want to be myself.’ When asked to explain exactly what that self was, she’d floundered. What she really wanted, what she longed for, was an open life, one in which she could find out about herself and thrive, not simply survive as her mother had done. And she was certainly finding out now. She’d discovered something of her courage and her fearlessness but had concluded courage was only valid in the face of fear. If it came easily, it wasn’t courage at all. Courage was a choice.

  ‘Join me for lunch,’ the Major said suddenly. ‘I know somewhere quiet and modest where we won’t be disturbed. Will you be able to make your way to your friend’s place afterwards?’

  Maxine smiled. ‘Of course, and how lovely. I hadn’t expected to be fed as well as given a lift.’

  ‘Or, if you prefer, I can instruct my driver to drop you at your friend’s place as soon as we arrive.’

  ‘It’s fine. I’m hungry.’

  He gave her a warm smile.

  As they drew up at the grand six-storey Excelsior hotel situated on the north bank of the Arno and facing Piazza Ognissanti, it was busier than Maxine had expected. German trucks were parked right around the piazza and cars were constantly pulling up. He asked her to wait outside for a moment and then he went in. Obviously the building had been requisitioned but even so, when she glanced through the window to watch Bruckner, she was taken aback by the grand marble-pillared entrance hall teeming with German and Fascist officers and not a single woman in sight.

  After lunch she went to find 12 Piazza d’Azeglio, the address Marco had given her where she would meet Gerhard Wolf’s clerk and find out more about the partisan leader Ballerini. The square, it turned out, was a beautiful formal garden that looked as if it had been inspired by the squares she’d briefly enjoyed when she’d been in London. There were trees, hackberry and sycamore, several pathways and flower beds, and the buildings surrounding the square were not medieval but looked as if they had been built in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.

  A middle-aged woman with a hook nose and dyed black hair opened up at her knock, and after Maxine delivered the password, she was shown into a back room, where she met with a neat, bespectacled young man who was pacing back and forth, looking nervous and worried. He held out his hand.

  ‘Antonio.’

  ‘Was that your mother?’ she asked.

  He shook his head. ‘I don’t live here.’

  ‘Partisans?’

  He nodded.

  At that moment another man entered the room. He looked down at heel and hungry, and Maxine could tell by the tight expression on his thin face that he was one of the Florentine partisans. He said his name was Stefano.

  She clarified who she was, and then Antonio explained that he was a clerk in the office of the German Consul and that he had information. Two Nazi officers were due to meet with Wolf in a few days’ time. He’d heard one of them would be Kesselring, and he was planning to listen in to what was being said. Looking at Antonio, Maxine doubted the man would have the skill to do so undetected, but as he was all they had she had to pin her hopes on him.

  ‘Kesselring,’ she remarked with a whistle. Kesselring, the man who was in direct command of all German forces in Italy. ‘What is the meeting for?’

  Stefano spoke up this time. ‘Antonio has already picked up that it may be to do with the arrangement for the storage of armaments. That’s why the partisan Marco sent you to us. Wolf is worried that some weapons have already been stored in a major palazzo, though we don’t yet know which one.’

  Maxine frowned. ‘But he’s a German – he thinks that’s a problem because –?’

  ‘Because if it’
s hit by Allied bombs the entire street might go up in smoke and all the palazzos with it. Wolf is determined to preserve as much of Renaissance and medieval Florence as he can.

  ‘We now know the consignment from the Beretta factory will be arriving any day. We are keeping a watch on the station here and those just outside Florence too. But since some Beretta sub-machine guns were appropriated from the factory by partisans last October, the Germans have doubled their security on the trains.’

  ‘The consulate is very small,’ Antonio said. ‘Only four rooms between the German Evangelical mission and the Lutheran pastorate. It’s not too difficult to overhear if you know how.’

  Maxine nodded and Antonio continued.

  ‘Wolf removed Hitler’s portrait, you know, from where it was hanging behind his desk. He took it down and replaced it with a lithograph of Goethe instead. Head and shoulders, turned three-quarter length to the left and wearing a fur collar.’

  ‘Kesselring won’t like that,’ Maxine said, and they all smiled.

  ‘Wolf is a good man,’ Antonio said. ‘He had his work cut out to persuade the Nazis to post him as consul here. He came three years ago with his wife and daughter. I’ll get a message to you saying when and where to meet me when – or if – I have more information.’

  ‘You know about Radio Cora?’ Stefano said, looking directly at her. ‘That’s how you’ll be able to let the Allies know where the armaments are, and you’ll be able to disclose whether we get them or not. They might find a way to help us.’

  ‘I need to let my liaison officer know about the situation here too.’

  ‘How do you mean?’

  ‘Where the partisans are, how many there are and so on, not just whether they have weapons. I was told to find Ballerini.’

  Stefano sighed. ‘Ballerini was killed recently. A brave man. Our anarchist leader.’

  ‘I’m sorry to hear it,’ she said, but – damn! – she hadn’t expected that.

  ‘And in December Manetti and Ristori, the leaders of the other group, were shot. They used to hole up in Monte Morello. It’s the highest mountain in the Florence plain and takes about four hours to get to on foot. Maybe half an hour in a vehicle.’

  ‘So who is leader now?’

  He pulled a face. ‘It’s early days. Ballerini’s group have joined with another group called the Garibaldi Black Wolves. They are in the Calvana Mountains now.’

  ‘Where is that?’

  ‘About forty kilometres away. There are hidden trails through the forests, hills and small rural villages and that’s where they are.’

  ‘And what about in Florence itself?’

  ‘People come and go. You want Luca, he’ll tell you.’

  ‘And Luca is –’

  She was interrupted at that moment by the middle-aged woman coming back in. ‘Quick. Four of them. In the street heading this way.’

  Antonio paled but seemed to know what to do. He and Stefano indicated Maxine should follow them to the back of the house and then out through an alley which opened into the street a few yards up from where the four German soldiers were now standing. Maxine went first and tried to look nonchalant as she sauntered up the street and away from them. At first, she thought she’d got away with it but then, unsettled by a weird mixture of caution in her bones and nervousness in her blood, she worried she had not. With a sharp intake of breath, she quickly turned to her right, hoping to double back on herself and walk in what she thought was the right direction for the river and away from the men.

  She needed to make her way to the Ponte Vecchio and hoped to easily follow Sofia’s directions to the house. But then her stomach tightened, even before she saw the four soldiers swaggering down the street and coming her way. They had simply gone the other way around and were now heading her off. One look at their arrogant stride and the rifles slung over their shoulders was all it took to realize she was about to become their prey. The tallest of them stared at her, unblinking, his icy-blue eyes expressionless.

  ‘Papers,’ he ordered and held out a gloved hand while one of the others lit a cigarette.

  She clenched her jaw as she pulled out her false papers and handed them over. Would they pass muster this time? The minutes passed slowly, and her mouth became dry. She began to count in her head. It helped distract her from the fear. At any moment the man might suspect the papers were phoney and, if that happened, she’d need her wits about her.

  The man continued to make a meal of it, sharing a joke in German with the other three, who clapped him on the back and guffawed. They gave her sideways looks, enjoying her discomfort, and the tall one raised his brows as he scrutinized her.

  ‘What were you doing in Piazza d’Azeglio?’ he asked. ‘We have been keeping a watch there.’

  ‘I was asking for directions.’

  He tilted his head to one side. ‘Where to?’

  ‘My friend’s house.’

  ‘And where is that?’

  ‘The Lungarno, further along from the Ponte Vecchio.’

  He whistled. ‘Fine friends you must have.’

  They spoke in German for a few minutes, almost none of which she understood, and only after they had taunted her a little longer did they hand the papers back.

  ‘You’ll have to run if you want to make it.’ He glanced at his wristwatch and tapped it. ‘Curfew.’

  ‘I’m not sure I fancy her chances,’ one of the others said.

  She ignored this, let out a long, slow breath and walked briskly on, aware they were still watching her.

  The curfew had not yet begun, but the German and Fascist patrols were everywhere and she could now hear that the four soldiers were still following her. She darted down an alley hoping it might be a short cut in the right direction but, spying the men ahead of her now, backed out smartly, heart racing. How had they managed to do that? But there were so many interconnecting roads and alleys, anything was possible. Get a grip, she ordered herself. Get a grip. After that she had to retrace her steps, except now all the streets and alleys were looking alike. Bewildered, she swivelled round trying to decide which way to go and, at a complete loss, scratched the back of her neck as she deliberated. She glanced at her watch. Only five minutes until the curfew began.

  With her back tight against cold stone walls, she slipped from one cobbled alley to another, glancing in at dimly lit, smoky bars where ruddy-faced German soldiers were drinking and clapping while pounding out the rhythm on the tables. She jumped when a dog began barking behind her. A patrol dog?

  A woman shouted somewhere and jackboots pounded on the street. But where? She brushed up against a windowsill, trying to conceal herself, and accidentally set a pot of herbs clattering to the ground, their scent filling the air. She froze as a German voice shouted Halt, followed by another more insistent Halt! Surely not those four men again? She mouthed an obscenity and then, chancing her luck, ran fast as she headed for the river and whichever bridge she happened across. If the worst came to the worst, there would be hiding places beneath the bridges or even on the boats.

  She knew her luck was in when she reached the Ponte Vecchio, but she could also see it was heavily guarded. She spotted the Uffizi extending out towards the river, flanked by arches and fancy columns. Instead of following the river she’d have to use the backstreets and locate the correct rear entrance, but still she made several wrong turns in this maze of a medieval city. Eventually, with relief flooding her body, she found the narrow alley where, at the end, she saw the tall iron gates Sofia had described. She glanced up. In the gathering gloom, she fumbled about in a row of flowerpots resting against the wall and eventually winkled out the key. Sofia must have oiled the lock and the hinges because the key turned easily and she was able to slowly ease the gate open.

  She reached the back of the enormous house, knocked and waited. Nobody answered. Something was rustling in the undergrowth and now she could see the moon through a break in the cloud. She was about to throw a stone at one of the windows when a shu
tter was opened above her and, with a huge rush of relief, she saw Sofia peering out.

  A few moments later Sofia had opened the door, grabbed Maxine’s arm and pulled her inside a gloomy vestibule.

  Maxine exhaled noisily. ‘Phew. I was beginning to think you’d never come.’

  ‘Let’s go through to the kitchen.’

  Once inside the kitchen Maxine could see the lights had been kept low and the shutters were firmly bolted. Anna sat at the table, staring up at her with unfathomable eyes.

  ‘So,’ Anna said. ‘You took your time.’

  ‘I only got here today, but you’ll want to hear what I have to say.’

  ‘I can offer you an aperitivo,’ Sofia said, fetching a bottle and a plate of tomato and garlic bruschetta.

  Maxine remembered her mother fondly describing the tradition of being served an aperitivo. Not just a pre-dinner drink, as Maxine had imagined, but offered with tasty morsels. Maxine herself had been hungrily looking forward to trying bruschetta with a variety of toppings: slices of mortadella or prosciutto, maybe mozzarella, or tomato and basil. And yet she had only seen it on the tables frequented by Germans in the Caffè Paszkowski: or in other bright, shiny places.

  She pulled out a chair and sat opposite Anna. Sofia, looking far too pale, was now standing with her back to the range. The kitchen wasn’t warm.

  Maxine went on to tell them about meeting Bruckner and how he’d given her a lift, and then she told them about her meeting with Antonio, Gerhard Wolf’s clerk, and the partisan, Stefano.

  Sofia nodded. ‘I met with Gerhard Wolf myself. He didn’t give much away. I got the feeling he would have liked to say more but could not.’

  32.

  Sofia woke with her mouth watering, feeling disappointed the creamy fig and ricotta tart she could taste had been only a dream. She and her mother used to prepare it together. Her job had been to grind the almonds and make the pastry by adding the almonds to the flour, then together they’d create the filling by combining drained ricotta with eggs, honey, lemon zest and vanilla. Once they’d taken it out of the oven, they decorated it with quarters of sliced figs. Delicious.