“Send Fabrizio and the dog,” Angela said. “The rest of us will stay.”
Fabrizio stepped out from behind Connors. “I will never leave my friends,” the youngest of them said.
Connors reached down and lifted the small boy into his arms, holding him against the flowing blood of his upper body. He kissed Fabrizio on the cheek and stared into his gentle eyes.
“It was a miracle we took it this far,” Franco said. “I thought we would all be dead the first time we tried to fight the Nazis.”
“We were just one miracle short,” Connors said, looking down at the circling tanks. “That is, if you believe in those things.”
They heard the plane before they saw it.
The B-24 came from out of the smoke and the clouds to bear down on the Nazi tanks. Vincenzo stepped away from the door and looked up at the American plane, firing at the now-fleeing tanks, chasing them into the alleys at the far end of the square. He turned and glanced over at Connors and shrugged, half his face covered in blood. “It’s getting harder not to believe in miracles,” he said.
The B-24’s machine-gun turrets riddled the last remaining Nazi soldiers in the square, then circled back, giving the Panzers time to clear away from the area. It swooped down one final time and dropped three hundred pounds of bomb on top of the three tanks, sending each to its final destiny.
The streets of Naples were free of Nazi rule.
Connors, Vincenzo and the others walked down the steps of the church, out into the burning square. They moved together silently through the smoke and haze, staring at the bodies of the children and soldiers that filled the piazza. They stopped in front of the fountain and Nunzia’s body. “I want to bury her,” Connors said to Vincenzo. “Do you know a place she would have liked?”
“Nunzia was like her father,” Vincenzo said. “She loved the sea and the city. There are places along Piazza Trento e Trieste where she can see both.”
“Take us there,” Connors said.
The American turned and lifted Nunzia’s body into his arms and walked with her slowly past each remaining street boy. One by one, they gently kissed her folded hands. Connors followed Vincenzo out of the square and into the darkness of a quiet alley. The rest of the group inched in behind them, their wounds still open and bleeding, their hands finally free of guns, the Italian sun warming their backs.
They kept their heads bowed in silent prayer as they went off to bury one more of their dead.
35
LUNGOMARE
The bonfires lit the night sky.
The group sat around the warm flames, drinking from tin cups filled with red wine, their wounds bandaged as well as possible, staring out at the quiet sea and up toward a blanket of stars. Fabrizio rested his head against the side of the sitting mastiff, both of them gently drifting off to sleep. Connors lit a cigarette and offered one to Dante. “I’m not a sergeant yet,” the boy said, shaking his head.
“You fight like one,” Connors said, sliding the pack back into his pocket.
“No planes, no tanks and no soldiers,” Vincenzo said. “It’s been years since that was true.”
“What happens to us now?” Angela asked, her leg wrapped in cloth, blood still seeping through.
“The Americans should be here in a day or two,” Connors said. “Some medical units as well. They’ll try to find anyone who’s left from your families and put you together with them.”
“We won’t have to worry about getting killed,” Franco said. “But now we have to figure out how to live.”
“That’s always going to be harder,” Connors told him. “No matter what side of the war you’re on.”
“What about you?” Claudio asked. “Where will you go?”
“I’ll stay here until my unit comes in,” Connors said.
“The Thunderbirds,” Vincenzo said, eyeing the patch once again.
“Right.” Connors gave him a knowing nod. “Then, wherever they go, I’ll go with them.”
“Will you get into trouble for helping us?” Vincenzo asked.
“They don’t ever get too mad at you for killing the enemy.” Connors tossed the last of his cigarette into the fire. “Whatever they come down with, I can handle.”
“I’m happy you stayed with us, American,” Vincenzo said. “We all are. It’s your victory as much as ours.”
“Was it worth it?” Connors asked, staring at him from across the fire.
“Yes,” Vincenzo said without hesitation.
“Just for you or for everybody?”
“It means as much to the ones who died as it does to the ones who live,” Vincenzo said, standing now and facing the fire. “This fight wasn’t for us. It was for Naples.”
Franco and Dante threw more wood on the fire, watching it grow bigger, giving the night an afternoon’s warmth and glow. The group sat closer to the fire. Connors looked past them toward the quiet lapping of the bay. He closed his eyes and smiled when he heard them begin to sing the first words to their favorite Neapolitan love ballad.
They stayed until early morning, singing the slow and sad lyrical words to “Parla Mi D’Amore, Mariu.” Their faces were warm and their cheeks red, their wounded bodies aching from the weight of battle. They lifted their eyes toward the sky and sang out in full voice as they held one another.
They were all that remained of a battered army of children, determined to die for the sake of their freedom.
And now they had finally found peace.
On the streets of a ruined city they could once again claim as their own.
EPILOGUE
Without victory, there is no survival.
—WINSTON CHURCHILL
STAZIONE TERMINALE, NAPLES
OCTOBER 15, 1943
Vincenzo stood on the crowded platform looking up at the train. His shirt and pants pockets were crammed with official-looking documents, all stamped by both the American forces now in place in Naples and members of a provisional government that had been installed to oversee the rebuilding of the city.
Much had happened since the end of their battle against the Nazi tanks. The Americans had come in several days later and taken control of Naples. The boys were given medical aid and attention. Connors came by each day to check on their status. He eventually moved out with the rest of his Thunderbird division, heading up north toward Amalfi and the coast.
“Will you ever come back to Naples?” Vincenzo had asked the last time he saw the American.
“Why wouldn’t I?” Connors said to him. “I have a lot of friends here.”
Once their wounds were healed, Angela and the boys were put in temporary quarters as soldiers and city officials sought any surviving members of their families. One by one, each member of the group was sent to live in a place he or she would call home. There, they could once again be children, instead of soldiers.
Vincenzo picked up the valise by his side, packed with clothes given him by soldiers, and walked toward the steps of the train.
An American officer blocked his path.
Vincenzo stared up at him and saw that he wore the same patch as Connors on the side of his shirt. He put down his valise and waited for the American to speak.
“Are you Vincenzo?” the officer asked.
“Yes,” the boy said.
“My name’s Anders. Do you have a couple of minutes for me?”
“The train doesn’t leave for another twenty minutes,” Vincenzo said.
“How about we sit on that bench over there?” Anders pointed to a stone slab just off to the right. “You want some coffee or anything?”
“No,” Vincenzo said, walking to the bench and sitting down. “I have all I need.”
“Where’s the train taking you?” he asked. The captain sat down next to the boy and put an unlit cigar into a corner of his mouth.
“Milano,” Vincenzo said. “My aunt lives there. My father’s sister. She’s going to take me in.”
Anders nodded his head, both hands flat across the
tops of his knees. “You and your boys gave those Nazis one helluva run,” he said.
“Why are you here?” Vincenzo asked.
Anders gave the boy a slight smile. “Connors told me you didn’t have much patience for bullshit,” the captain said. “As usual, he wasn’t lying.”
Anders reached a beefy hand inside his uniform jacket, pulled out a thin yellow envelope and handed it to Vincenzo. The boy took the envelope and held it on his lap.
“After Naples, I sent Connors and some of my Thunderbirds up the coast,” the captain said. “They teamed up with the Texas Division and some of the Brits and went against the Nazis who were fighting their way down from Rome. Some of those battles got pretty hot and not all of them went our way.”
“What happened to Connors?” Vincenzo asked, fearing he already knew the answer.
“I lost a lot of good men in those fights,” Captain Anders said, staring down hard at the boy by his side. “Steve Connors was one of them.”
The two sat silently for several minutes, gazing out as passengers rushed to catch the waiting train. “Before he went out,” Anders continued, “he asked me to give you that envelope, just in case anything happened. I don’t know what he put in it, but he said whatever it was, you had earned it.”
Vincenzo took a deep breath and wrapped his fingers around the yellow envelope, his throat dry, his lower lip trembling.
“He respected you, kid,” Anders said. “He respected all of you.”
“And one of us he loved,” Vincenzo said in a low voice. “Nunzia.”
“For what it’s worth,” Anders added, “we checked on that Panzer colonel. Von Klaus. He was pretty banged up but he got out of Naples alive. He probably wished he hadn’t. When he got back home, he walked into his house and found his family shot dead and the SS waiting in his dining room.”
“He was only a soldier,” Vincenzo said.
Captain Anders took a deep breath and stood up, then placed his hands on the boy’s shoulders. “I would wish you luck, son,” he said. “But that would be nothing but a waste of time. You know that better than I do. We just try to live while we can and make the best of it. So you just be well and stay well.”
Vincenzo gripped the envelope tighter and watched as Captain Anders turned and disappeared into the crowd.
Vincenzo sat in a seat next to a large window. He felt the train inch its way forward, easing away from the platform and out of the station, the puffs of white smoke from its front stack cascading down around the tracks. He took a deep breath and tore open one side of the yellow envelope. He reached inside and pulled out the Thunderbird patch Connors had worn on his sleeve. He stared at it for several seconds, his moist eyes blurring his vision. He brought the patch up to his chest, lowered his head and cried silent tears.
The train was now chugging along its path, engine running at full throttle, heading north. Vincenzo lifted his head and looked out at the passing scenery, a maze of battered homes, blocked-off roads and military convoys. He caught his reflection in the thick glass and wiped the sides of his face with the palm of his hand.
Outside, white smoke billowed from the front of the train, sending thick clouds streaming through the air.
It was a day of peace in a time of war.
BY LORENZO CARCATERRA
A SAFE PLACE: The True Story of a Father, a Son, a Murder
SLEEPERS
APACHES
GANGSTER
STREET BOYS
A Ballantine Book
Published by The Ballantine Publishing Group
Copyright © 2002 by Lorenzo Carcaterra
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions.
Published in the United States by The Ballantine Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, and simultaneously in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto.
Ballantine and colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.
www.ballantinebooks.com
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Carcaterra, Lorenzo.
Street boys / Lorenzo Carcaterra.—1st ed.
p. cm.
1. Italy—History—Allied occupation, 1943–1947—Fiction. 2. World War, 1939–1945—Italy—Naples—Fiction. 3. World War, 1939–1945—Children—Fiction. 4. Street children—Fiction. 5. Naples (Italy)—Fiction. 6. Orphans—Fiction. 7. Boys—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3553.A653 S77 2002
813'.54—dc21
2002074734
eISBN: 978-0-345-46180-3
v3.0
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