Paradiso: Utterly gripping and emotional historical fiction (The Paradiso Novels Book 1)

by Francesca Scanacapra

‘Of course. I’ll be fine in a minute.’

  ‘Do you want us to stay with you?’

  ‘No, no. You go on home. I’ll be gambolling like a spring lamb once I’ve caught my breath.’

  We left my father at the cemetery. Retracing our steps took us barely twenty minutes. When we went to fetch him that evening we found him lying exhausted on the steps. He had drained the last of his medicine. The walk home took over two hours.

  My father’s boots, which had been wrecked as a result of his accident, would have cost at least 1,000 lire to replace - a sum that was so far beyond our means that they might as well have cost a million. My mother had fashioned a pair of shoes for him from canvas and made the soles from an old bicycle tyre, but they could not withstand the walks to and from the cemetery. They wore through after just three days, leaving my poor father’s feet blistered and stone-lamed. My mother had enough rubber to replace one sole, but had to resort to layers of fabric and cardboard for the other, which made walking even more painful for him.

  Somehow my aunt bartered a pair of sturdy leather boots for him. They were not new, of course, but were of good quality and had been used very little. I watched as my mother laced them up. My father walked twice around the kitchen table, grinning, then sat gazing at his booted feet for a long time, before inviting me to join him to admire them.

  ‘I’m glad that someone else has gone to the trouble of wearing them in,’ he said. ‘Although I have never owned a pair of brand new boots myself, I have known men who have, and have been driven mad by the way they creak. These are just perfect. They have had most of the creak worn out of them.’

  *

  As the lorry drove along the straight flat roads of the Lombardy plains, so many thoughts of home were going through my mind that I had little notion of time passing. It was only when the terrain changed and began to rise that I was jolted back into reality.

  The roads became rougher. Every bump and pothole jarred our backs and shook our little bones. Numerous children were sick and those unfortunate enough to be seated next to them were showered with vomit. I clutched my dolly and my small bundle on my lap, keeping them out of the way of the pool of sick on the floor, which oozed my way whenever we rounded a right-hand bend.

  My possessions were stuffed into a rudimentary bag which my mother had created for me out of a piece of old apron. There were strict rules about what we could take. I had heard her complaining that it was not enough, hence the reason why I was so over-dressed. We were allowed one change of clothing, a nightdress and slippers, if we had them, and very little else. My mother was right. It turned out to be a pitifully inadequate amount of clothing. I was grateful for my father’s warm woollen socks, which made my boots so tight, but I could pull them up right over my knees, almost to the middle of my thighs.

  The lorry laboured up winding roads, its gears grating before every corner. It spewed out smoke so thick it made us choke and left a greasy brown residue on our skins. It was probably a mercy that we were in an open lorry, or I am certain we would have been asphyxiated by the fumes.

  We seemed to be climbing for a long time and as the inclines sharpened, we were all squashed back towards the tailgate.

  A long-faced girl was talking to the girl in a pink hat.

  ‘I saw them,’ she said. ‘I saw those boys laid out on the church steps. There was blood everywhere.’

  ‘My nonna watched them being shot,’ said the girl in the pink hat.

  ‘There was another boy shot too.’

  ‘The one lying in the road?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘He had nothing to do with it. They said he was just running away.’

  I said nothing. I looked up at the sky and thought of Ernesto again. The light was fading; small windows of dim blue punctured the grey covering of clouds. I wondered whether he could see me. I thought of our last walk to the village, then of my father staggering home carrying his body. I pictured him lying dressed in his Sunday best in his darkened bedroom, of my aunt cradling him in her arms.

  The sound of his voice repeated in my mind: ‘I’ll be an angel.’

  ‘My mother said those German pigs got what they deserved,’ said the girl in the pink hat, then she turned to me. ‘Don’t you think so?’

  ‘The Germans didn’t come to my house,’ I replied, looking down at my doll.

  ‘They came to mine. They pointed a gun at my brother. I’m glad they were poisoned after what they did. I hope they find out who poisoned them and give them a medal.’

  The lorry ground to a halt. My whole body felt stiff and bruised. I had little idea of how long the journey took. All I knew was that it felt interminable and that nausea had given way to ravenous hunger. I had eaten little since Ernesto’s death.

  We were lifted out of the lorry one by one by the old driver, whose mushy cigarillo had dissolved into a brown stain in the corner of his mouth.

  We looked all around, but we could not see a convent, or any building at all. We had simply reached the end of the road. A wave of panic surged through us. The girl in the pink hat grabbed my arm.

  ‘They lied!’ she shrieked. ‘There’s nothing here! They’re just going to leave us here to die!’

  A cacophony of screams and cries exploded into a frantic stampede as girls tried to clamber back into the truck. Somehow, amongst the hysteria of shoving and pushing, I managed to climb on too. I was elbowed, knocked over and squashed beneath a scramble of bodies. In the commotion I lost my bundle and my doll.

  The driver was shouting and pulling back the girls who had not managed to get back into the lorry. They fought him, lashing out and screaming to be taken back home.

  It was only the appearance of two nuns which finally calmed us. I was one of the first to see them. They came into view from behind a craggy outcrop, making their way down a rocky track. Seeing our distress, they assured us that we had not been abandoned - and we were instructed to follow them. We would have to walk the rest of the way as the only path which led to the convent was not suitable for a vehicle as large as the lorry.

  One by one we were lifted back down. I found my bundle of possessions undamaged, but my dolly had been trampled on. Her good arm had been torn off and she had a footprint on her face. I stuffed her into my coat and joined the line of girls being assembled by the nuns.

  The path which led to the convent was steep and made of shiny, step-worn stones. We picked our way through, following the nuns.

  I had never seen mountains before. They seemed so dark and alien compared with my familiar landscape of flat fields and huge, open skies. There was a sharpness in the air, the unfamiliar smell of pinewoods and the echoing calls of birds which I did not recognise. Even the clouds seemed different. For the first time in my life I could not see the horizon.

  It was made worse by the fact that I did not know which direction I was facing. I knew that we lived along the North Road, because it headed north out of Pieve Santa Clara. I knew that the village was south of our house. On a clear day I could see the top of the belfry. The sun rose in the east because I could watch it rise beyond Zia Mina’s vegetable garden, and it set in the west, behind Rita’s house. As I looked around there was nothing to indicate any cardinal point. It was a disorientating sensation.

  As we rounded an enormous boulder, the Convent of the Blessed Virgin came into view.

  The ancient building stood entirely alone, perched on a narrow plateau cut into the steep hillside. Its enormous fortress-like walls rose up three storeys. The few windows which pierced its outer confines were small and shuttered. A single slim bell-tower reached skywards.

  Several more nuns stood outside to greet us, ruffling like blackbirds as the wind caught their habits.

  We were herded through enormous front doors. My whole body was tight with dread. Nobody spoke. We were a stunned, shivering, moth-eaten gaggle of frightened little girls, stepping into an unknown world. However, the nuns fussed kindly, asking our names and promising us that we were finally
safe.

  ‘Welcome, girls, welcome,’ they said cheerfully. ‘Come in out of the cold.’

  There was little discernible difference between the cold outside and the cold inside. As I stood in the cavernous entrance I felt a chill rise through the flagstones, bite through the soles of my boots, through my layers of stockings and socks and into my feet, which seemed to freeze instantly.

  The convent walls were stained with mildew. The ceiling was a patchwork of bulging plaster, exposed bricks and shoddy repairs. There was a musty smell of stale lamp oil, mice and decay. Even when the colossal doors were closed behind us with an almighty, echoing bang, we could still feel the wind blowing.

  I stood immobile clutching my bag and my doll, repeating my mother’s words to myself.

  ‘Everything will be all right. Be a good girl and everything will be all right.’

  Chapter 3

  Although everything around me was new, frequently unfathomable and often uncomfortable, I acclimatised reasonably well to life in the care of the sisters. We were treated firmly, but kindly. They kept us occupied and encouraged prayer if melancholy overwhelmed us. We existed in a world of unwavering piety, where anything could be surmounted through faith and prayer.

  Talk of war was discouraged and talk of our families was only allowed if it did not cause us distress. The sisters told us that Mary was our Mother and God was our Father; they were always with us and always would be, so we had no cause to feel alone or abandoned.

  Our days were rigorously structured. We attended chapel three times and worked, learned and prayed in between, with the exception of Sundays and Feast Days when the quantity of prayer increased. We knew what time it was and where we should be by the ringing of different bells.

  There was the bell-tower bell, which rang with a dull clang, announcing prayer times and indicating that we should be in the chapel. The high-pitched, chiming refectory bell signalled mealtimes. If the nuns needed to attract our attention for anything else, they would ring a jangling hand bell and we would have to follow its sound until we found them, which was not always easy in a building which echoed so much.

  Exploration of the convent was not encouraged, but few of us had any interest in probing its dank, pitch-black interior. There was no electricity. Most of the rooms were unused. Eerie winds whistled down the long corridors. Doors and windows groaned and heaved, and hinges and latches rattled and clanked. Tales of ghosts and poltergeists were rife.

  The convent was home to around thirty working sisters. It also housed half a dozen very ancient nuns with faces like whiskery walnuts, who spent most of their time sitting by the fire in the refectory, either dozing or in prayer - although it could be difficult to discern which as both involved nodding and murmuring.

  The unexpected presence of a group of little girls was a delight to them. They had not seen children for years. During their more alert moments they took pleasure in our company, encouraging us to sing or dance for them.

  The only exception was old Sorella Brunilde, whose toothless face appeared to be folding in upon itself. It looked like a sheet of crumpled brown paper stuffed into her wimple. She would mutter and grumble about the noise and the disruption we caused, even if we were being quiet. Sometimes she would curse wildly, shaking her tiny fists and raving about sodomites. We didn’t know who the sodomites were, but clearly they had wronged her in some way. When we asked one of the other sisters who they were, she told us that they were from the city of Sodom. This was only vaguely helpful as we did not know where Sodom was, although one girl said she thought it was the capital of England.

  The sisters tolerated a certain amount of coarse language from old Sorella Brunilde, but profanities and blasphemy were not accepted. They would scold her. She would return a few choice words, mumble resentfully through her gums, usually about sodomites, and fall silent. The incident would appear to be forgotten within moments.

  Shortly after our arrival, Sorella Brunilde was found outside in a state of confusion and partial undress and had to be apprehended by two of the younger sisters, who hitched up their voluminous skirts and chased the old nun at some speed around the garden. It was a mystery as to how Sorella Brunilde had managed to unbolt and heave open the huge front door in order to make her escape. It was also astonishing that such an elderly nun could run so fast.

  I had left Pieve Santa Clara during the first winter chills, but they were nothing compared with the cold at the convent in Lodano. The ancient building was battered by winds which whipped from the north-east. The sisters said that the winds came from Russia, where it was colder than any of us could imagine. The start of the winter was wet, and once the rain subsided, icy sleet took its place. Hard blizzards of sharp snow soon followed. The nuns did not allow us to go outside, although the building was so draughty and leaky that we might as well have been in the open air.

  The physical discomfort of the cold was not helped by the fact that I was constantly hungry.

  Although I had never known anything other than rationing, I had come from an agricultural community blessed with orchards, vegetable gardens and chickens. Despite the war, sweet, fat grapes still dropped from the vines outside Zia Mina’s kitchen. Fleshy tomatoes still ripened in the garden. The fruit trees still burst forth quantities of peaches, plums and pears. We had eggs and meat at least twice a week.

  The government organised the collection and redistribution of foodstuffs, but abuse of the system was rife. Even good, honest families such as my own concealed undeclared harvests and sold and bartered their surplus. There was never any waste. Whatever could not be consumed or exchanged when in season would be preserved, pickled or salted.

  Of course we had experienced shortages. My aunt had complained that due to the lack of decent sugar she had not been able to preserve all the peaches and cherries from her orchard. My parents had also grumbled about the price of meat, so beans and lentils had begun to appear in our meals in ever increasing amounts to replace it.

  Despite the shortages, I had never experienced real and prolonged hunger at home. It was not the case at the convent.

  The sisters kept a few stringy chickens which rarely produced any eggs. They grew what they could in the convent garden, but the short summers and rocky soil were poor for growing food and the quantity they produced was paltry. Even during peacetime they relied on bringing in provisions from outside.

  The only food available was what our pooled ration cards would allow. Anything and everything which could be eaten was seized upon. Even bags of bones, stripped clean of any vestige of meat, were gratefully received and made into broth.

  The scant allowance of pasta, which turned to glue when boiled, and the tiny rations of polenta were barely enough to ward off starvation. Our allocation of rationed bread was of miserable quality, often blackish-grey in colour and prone to go stale almost immediately. It was made with ground root vegetables instead of flour, or even silage, and would dissolve into a gummy, indigestible paste in our watery soups.

  Although wheat flour had been in short supply at home, it could be procured. My parents had not had to resort to the rationed bread, which was not considered fit for human consumption and would be collected by a local farmer to feed his pigs. Those who donated their bread were given a salami or two in return when the pig was slaughtered.

  Some girls had nightmares about bombs and campaigns of terror. I dreamed about jam and eggs. The sisters fretted that we were not adequately fed and decreased their own modest rations to child-sized portions. They must have been awfully hungry, but they never complained.

  Our rations were brought to the convent every week, weather permitting. A very old man would arrive with his cart, which was pulled by a bad-tempered mule called Alfonso. Our attempts to pet Alfonso were not received kindly. He would snort, stamp his hooves and snap his teeth. He might have been better disposed if we had been able to spare a carrot for him. We tried to feed him handfuls of grass, but he spat them back at us.

  Thankfu
lly the ration man did not share the same irritable disposition as his mule. He could whistle any tune and sang songs about lost loves and mountain flowers. He liked to joke with us and would tell us that the churn on his cart was not full of milk, but of river water; then, as he eased the lid off, he would cry out, ‘It’s a miracle! The Good Lord has turned water into milk!’

  I had looked forward to my ration of milk very much, but I had been used to sweet and creamy cow’s milk. The milk which arrived at the convent came from goats and when I first tasted it all I wanted to do was to spit it out. It had an unpalatable, goaty tang and was full of hair. But as time went on and as my hunger grew, I became less fussy. I didn’t even mind the goat hair which got stuck between my teeth and caught in my throat.

  I was not unhappy about being at the convent because I understood that my parents had sent me there out of love, but I was frequently unhappy about being cold and hungry. The colder and hungrier I was, the unhappier I was.

  There were thirty-eight evacuated girls in total, aged between five and ten. We were divided into groups and each group was allocated a nun who provided the role of a mother for us. My ‘mother’ was Sorella Maddalena.

  Sorella Maddalena was around thirty years old, about the same age as my own mother. She had a pretty, heart-shaped face and kind brown eyes. We all liked her very much for she had a disposition which saw the good in everything. If ever melancholy or homesickness overwhelmed us, she would soothe us with an uplifting Bible story. She often spoke about her conversations with God and encouraged us to speak to Him directly during our prayers. Sorella Maddalena said that God was always listening.

  She gave us instructions on the correct way to pray. Her advice was practical and defined by clear rules about what was and was not appropriate to entreat. I could ask God for good things to happen. I could pray for my family’s safety. I could pray that Pieve Santa Clara would be spared from the bombing raids. I could pray that my father would not be in too much pain to undertake his work at the cemetery. However, praying for self-serving material things was not allowed. I did bend this rule occasionally by asking for better bread and a little bit of butter, but I always made sure that I asked that we could all have it so that God would not think me selfish.