Deportation, quota, visa, residence, official inspection and illegal aliens: the words were like standard counters in a game long familiar to the participants. At the end, Leary gave the members an impromptu report on the Kotlikoff affair. The faces around him had become serious—worried. Several men remembered Kotlikoff clearly, for this was the American Embassy where he’d taken sanctuary.
“Astonished,” said one member. “I couldn’t tell if he was shocked or delighted. He sat for hours looking out at them.”
It had been Kotlikoff’s first view of Americans—through the embassy windows—and in his journals he’d recorded the sight—American tourists on Easter vacation: with their cameras and sunglasses, strolling along Via Veneto; with their bored faces and sharp appraising eyes, passing in and out of the expensive shops; and with weary sighs, sitting under the long canopies of the sidewalk cafés of the de luxe hotels, the Excelsior, Flora, Ambasciatori, Majestic, and Regina Carlton, that safely insulated them from the city of Rome like immobile tour buses—sore-footed, museum-weary people, sipping Campari on ice and talking of home. Kotlikoff among the capitalists.
“He didn’t seem to know what to make of them.”
“I wonder,” another said, “if he ever thought he’d be the occasion for so much saber-rattling.”
Later, after the meeting, when the resident Americans had quietly slipped away into the Friday afternoon for a long weekend in the Italian countryside, Leary sat alone at an outside table of the Tre Scalini Café in the Piazza Navona, waiting to conduct the first of two pieces of business concerning the Kotlikoff affair: he awaited Arturo Sardi.
Taking off his glasses, Leary drowsed comfortably in the Roman sunlight, the odor of coffee in his nostrils, the sensations of the city passing over him: the cadenced music of Italian conversation over coffee cups, the never-still scuffing of waiters’ shoes, the clatter of dishes, and overhead the fluttering of pigeons’ wings, and beyond that the susurrating of Bernini’s fountain waters, a peaceful sound.
Kotlikoff had been here, had passed through the irresistible city on his way to adventure, to mischief, to events that would bring the world near war again. How? And for what? Why had a poet, a pacifist, raised up contending armies?
The tormenting sense of danger, like a twinge, bestirred him, and he opened his eyes. A man was sitting at a table nearby, looking sidewise at him: a chunky-faced, thick man in a dull blue suit and a dull blue tie, resting both arms on the table before a cup of coffee and puffing on a cigarette, the smoke languidly drifting away in light air. The man looked away, and Leary shut his eyes again.
Presently, the clip-clop of applause roused him. In the midst of the piazza near the Bernini fountain four men had set up a television camera and an upholstered chair done in a vivid red fabric. They were inviting passersby to try the chair, and, encouraged by the applause of the crowd, men and boys eagerly sat and posed and postured for the camera as though auditioning for the lead in a film. People in the apartments over the restaurants watched from their balconies—some called down instructions and opinions—while pedestrians crossing the piazza from all directions paused to watch and applaud.
Leary glanced around: the man was still there, head bent over his coffee, glancing sidewise as though trying to glimpse another’s poker hand.
Leary ordered another caffè doppio, then shut his eyes again. He hoped, when he’d open his eyes in a few moments, that the man would be gone. If not, he might have a problem. His forehead throbbed faintly.
“A tartufo, I believe you said.”
Leary smiled and opened his eyes. “What I said was I’m going to buy you the biggest tartufo in the history of Rome.”
“And I’m going to eat it—with pleasure, Signor Leary.” Arturo Sardi, tall and as flat as a board, watched Leary slowly sit up to put on his eyeglasses. He shook Leary’s hand and sat down. “You are still catching up on your sleep, eh? The last time we talked, you were returning two Italian immigrants from America after giving them some marvelous training in bank robbery in your American prisons.”
“The last time we talked, Signor Sardi, we strolled around up on the Pincio, and the leaves were blowing across the road. Winter was coming.”
“And now spring. When spring comes, the Roman feels as though the rent has been paid for another year. How goes it with you?” Sardi studied the wound on Leary’s forehead.
“A meeting is a meeting in Rome just as in Washington. Three hours’ sleep, three hours’ meeting, and tomorrow, Paris.”
Sardi had turned his eyes to study the crowd gathered around the chair and television camera, deliberately gazing at each face there, then examining the faces at the tables around him. His eyes rested briefly on the chunky-faced man. “What are you deporting this month? I think we are running short of car thieves. But then maybe we will have a war this month, instead, eh? I read that the Russians are very angry in New York.”
“And the Americans are very angry in Washington,” said Leary.
Sardi ordered a tartufo, glancing again at the fat-faced man.
“Tell me, did you ever hear of a man named Gabriele Napletano?”
Sardi turned his face to Leary’s and looked at him without interest. “Napletano? Should I?”
“His name was mentioned in an immigration case.”
“That’s all you can tell me?”
“That’s all I know. Someone in New York sent him some money here in Rome. We don’t know why.”
Sardi pushed his spoon into the chocolate ice-cream tartufo. “Napletano. Yes. Very interesting name.” He put his spoon down and regarded Leary. “There must be more that you can tell me.”
“No. All I have is a name on a check: Gabriele Napletano in Rome.”
Sardi regarded Leary for a solemn moment. “We play here in Rome a three-corner game these days. And I think I am the cheese in the trap.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Neither do I. Suddenly this name, Gabriele Napletano, is on everyone’s lips. I would like to meet him. Last week, a publishing house here in Rome burned to the ground. To the ground. Very professional job. Everything went—presses, warehouse, everything. We have some information that tells us to talk to one Gabriele Napletano. But it is a very strange thing. This publisher, you see, is an old-time fascist. He publishes trash—fascist trash and also pornography. Two kinds of trash. He’s a troublemaker and a headache to us. He just published a book you may know—it has a very bad history. In English it was famous as The Protocols of the Elders of Zion.”
“The Protocols. The old chestnut—”
“Yes, but there are still people who buy it. In any case, we have a small group of political Jews in Rome who didn’t like seeing this infamous anti-Jewish book printed again in Italian. It caused them no end of trouble when Mussolini was in power.”
“Same old names. Mussolini. Hitler.”
“Even your own Henry Ford was fooled by it.”
“So you think the Jews burned the publisher out?”
“Well, we want to talk to this Napletano.”
“He’s a Jew?”
“Oh, yes.”
Leary grunted. “That’s interesting. A Jew.”
“Why interesting?”
“You haven’t questioned him?”
“Well, you see, I have been less than—what is that very good English word I want?—ah—sedulous. I have been less than sedulous.”
“A very good English word. Does it mean that you haven’t been trying very hard?”
“Yes. We play, as I said, a three-corner game in Rome these days. That gentleman you keep staring at over there with the thick face—he’s part of the game. He often precedes me to my appointments. Isn’t that interesting? He knows where I am going often before I do, and he always has a front-row seat when I arrive. In fact, I’ve lately become solicitous for his health. He eats too many tartufos, too many gelati and other bonbons. He has a very big sweet tooth, and I enjoy watching his weakness. Then I take him fo
r long walks to work it off, you see. I understand that they have excellent ice cream in Russia, and maybe our tartufo reminds him of home.”
“Russian?”
“Yes.”
Leary considered that. “Why would a Russian agent follow a Roman police detective?”
Sardi made a mouth. “The quality of foreign agents in Rome is very poor. I suppose because it is not a sensitive post. The American agents are of the same caliber. It is fortunate for us, because the Roman police are very busy. We police are very ordinary too—ordinary men with great diligence and patience and not much else. My agent friend there follows me—why, you may ask. I do not know, but I have a feeling that he waits for me to find Napletano. But I do not like doing another’s work. I feel that if that gentleman wants to talk to Napletano, I should not go find him for him. True?”
“Is Napletano so hard to find?”
“I don’t know. What is that word again? Sedulous. I haven’t been trying so hard. I know where Napletano lives. In fact, we can walk there—it is over in the old ghetto section by the Tiber, behind the Jewish Temple. Does all this help you?”
“Total confusion.”
“I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay.”
“Would you like to take my Russian agent for his daily walk? We can stroll over to Napletano’s house. I would like to have you meet Napletano. I would like to hear the questions you ask him. But only after I finish my tartufo. I am sorry to tell you, this tartufo looks no larger than the usual.”
“Would a cup of cappuccino remedy it?”
When they left the Tre Scalini, Sardi took a last long look at the man with the chunky face. “Do you know about the Ardeatine Cave massacres?” he asked Leary.
“That’s the German reprisals.”
“Yes. A partisan bomb killed thirty-three German soldiers. So the Germans executed three hundred and thirty-five Italians in the Ardeatine Caves. More than ten for one. Made them kneel, then shot them through the head. Some were Jews, and I understand that Napletano had a relative—maybe a father or an uncle—who was a victim.”
The Israel Temple of Rome fronted on the Lungotevere Cenci, overlooking the Tiber. Sardi parked there and led Leary to the large metal plaque on the stone face of the Temple. “Those are the names of the Jews who were shot by the Nazis in the Ardeatine Caves.”
There was no Napletano on the list.
Sardi now led him back behind the Temple. There were small shops there—one offering picture frames, another upholstery. Specialità Ebraiche, said the sign over the restaurant: kosher food.
They walked back into the twisted streets of what had once been a fenced-in Roman ghetto. Alleys became lanes, lanes became narrow paths between ancient buildings. Wash hung on lines overhead, but they saw no people. A muffled heaviness was in the air.
“Is it always this quiet?”
Sardi nodded. “Usually.”
It was like a historic dead spot that transmitted no sound.
Napletano’s apartment house was built around a narrow vestibule in which stood a baby carriage with a broken spring. There was a faint odor of garbage and rot. Sardi knocked on the second-floor door.
Not much of the hundred thousand dollars had stayed in this house, Leary thought. Sardi knocked again. He walked up, then, to the third-floor landing and knocked. There was a long wait before the door finally opened and a long crack of daylight fell on the landing. A bent old man in a worn sweater jacket and a two-day beard gazed shrewdly at Sardi.
He answered Sardi’s question in a croupy, gravel-filled voice. “Si, si. Niente. Io non so.” Sardi finally broke off the conversation and descended the stairs.
“Wait,” he said to Leary. He left the building. A few moments later he returned with a portly middle-aged woman in carpet slippers and dress, gray hair in a knot at the base of her neck, and a torn sweater. She talked explosively, waving her hands and waggling a key at Sardi. Several apartment doors opened. She bent under the strain of her weight up the stairs, still talking, pulling herself up with the hand rail. When she reached Napletano’s door, she unlocked it and flung it open.
Sardi stepped in. The tenants quickly moved to the landing outside the door and peered in to watch. Leary walked in behind him.
The apartment was a surprise. It was handsomely furnished. There were some excellent antique pieces of furniture, a valuable Oriental rug on the living-room floor, Renaissance paintings, and a bookcase from floor to ceiling with books, many in handsome bindings. The kitchen was modern.
Sardi wafted a hand at the furnishings. “No thug, this one.”
There were two bedrooms, both comfortably furnished. Both empty. The bath was empty too. Sardi sniffed the air. “No one’s been here for a while—couple of weeks, maybe.” He spoke again to the landlady, and from the doorway she made another speech, while behind her the other tenants looked in, nodding and agreeing with murmurs.
Sardi gave Leary a curt nod and walked through the group and down the stairs. All eyes studied Leary openly as he stepped by and descended.
In the alley, Sardi said: “Napletano was here about ten days ago. There was another man here with him. A foreigner, she says—but to her a Sicilian might look like a foreigner or even a Milanese.”
“What did he look like?”
“Short, she said. If she says he’s short, he must be nearly a midget. Dark hair, gray here at the temples. Very thick glasses. And chunky. She said very chunky, lumpy—thick, thick arms, thick neck. Black eyes, she said. Like a crow. And he never talked once. Napletano left right after that, and then his family went away. No one’s been home for over a week.”
Sardi walked along the twisting lanes and alleys with complete familiarity. Faces looked down at them from upper windows, faces that had drawn back from the panes, faces silent with inquiring eyes. The old vestiges of fear and caution. The silence was smothering—in the noisy city, a strange dead spot, a Sabbatical silence, a sorrowful silence.
Back out in the main road, Sardi said: “The landlady said he’s visiting his sister, but no one knows where she lives. She referred to Napletano as Maestro.”
“What’s that mean?”
“A teacher. A professor. He speaks six languages.”
The profound silence of the old ghetto had surprised him—had reminded him of another ghetto in another city—and as Sardi walked away toward the Victor Emmanuel monument, followed by his overweight tartufo-eater, Leary halted before the Israel Temple and opened his attaché case. It was the opening entry of the first journal, and in that singular bold Russian handwriting that Leary had learned to picture with his eyes shut he read Kotlikoff on Venice:
We walked in the broad sunlight along the quay of the Venetian canal far away from the tourist section. It was after working hours in Venice, and the noisy streets were filled with working-men and their families. Sidewalk tables were crowded. Voices were exuberant. Dogs barked.
Children called. Canaries sang. From the canal the marine engines of the passing Numero 5 Water bus rumbled.
We paused at an archway.
“Signor Kotlikoff, it is down this lane. We can stop but a moment. We must hurry.” We walked along a cobbled footpath between old walls. There was a smell of urine and dried scuffed dog dung. Tired old buildings with dirty, dust-streaked windows leaned on each other. Here a tailor; there, an empty shop. Ancient brick was exposed through the broken cement of the walls. After a short walk, we came to a tiny square with an old community fountain to one side. Water had not flowed through it in many years. Already dusk had settled here, long before sunset, and a permanent silence lay, baffling the hearty noises of the quay.
“Here, Signor Kotlikoff, this is Piazza della Scuola. That is the Hebrew school, and that is the Hebrew Temple.”
On the wall of the Temple was a plaque commemorating the passing of Jewish soldiers who had died in World War II for Italy. Strange family names: Tedesco, Padoa, Polaccio—dead for Italy. On another wall, a reminder; the Jews who
had died in the Holocaust: two hundred Jews from Venice, eight thousand Jews from Italy, six million from Europe, killed by the odious barbarians.
The silence was suffocating. Just a few steps up an alley from the bright, noisy quay lay the little square in a twilit zone of silence; strange, unexpected, solemn.
“Mr. Kotlikoff. We must go!”
“What is this section called?”
“You are in great danger. We must get to Rome. Quickly. Please. Let us go!”
“Yes, but what is this called?”
“Campo del Ghetto Nuove.”
“This is the original ghetto?”
“Yes. Ghetto. It is the Italian for foundry. There was a Venetian foundry here in the sixteenth century. The Jews of Venice were ordered to live in this section.”
“Where are the Jews now?”
“Scattered. They live where they wish now—like me.”
“Many live here?”
“Yes. Near their Temple here. Please, we will go now. Rome is far.”
We walked from that stunning silence back to the noises and sights of a living city, the working, sweat-stained section of Venice, back to life and pursuit and menace. Quickly.
I felt like a modern archeologist poking in the ruins of an ancient civilization, in the prehistoric ashes of a cave fire. Gone. All gone before I had had a chance to find them, my own kind, bearing a piece of my lost heritage, Italian-speaking Jews chanting the same Hebrew prayers that my grandparents in Russia chanted.
Gone beyond reach.
Leary wondered if every city in Italy had its own dead spot: a series of dead spots parading down the spine of Italy—former ghettos, silent, listening, waiting for the first distant thump of a drum, the first quiver of the earth announcing that hate yet once more had reassembled its forces and machines under some new silken banner, some new old cry, some derivative symbol recalling all others. Of all the things that man loves, above all he loves to hate.
Leary repacked his case and considered his next piece of business: the view of the Porta Pia, the eastern gate of the city, at sundown. He looked for a cab.
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