Last Train from Liguria (2010)

by Christine Dwyer Hickey

‘Well, I don’t think that sounds like such a bad idea, Edward,’ Bella says. ‘I think we should listen, at least. I’m probably going to be turfed out after the hearing next week at the federal secretary’s office - so?’

  Edward ignores her and addresses the lawyer. ‘How are we supposed to do that? I mean, with all these travel restrictions and regulations - how the hell are we supposed to smuggle two Italian children out of Italy?’

  ‘I’m coming to that, Mr King. The Signora has it all arranged.’

  ‘Yes, well, she would have!’

  The lawyer puts his hand under the first package and raises it slightly. ‘This envelope first. You will travel as a family, husband, wife, son and new baby. There are papers in here for an Italian family of that description taking a holiday in Nice.’

  ‘Nice?’ Edward says. ‘France is far too risky, I know - we live close to the border, we see people being dragged back every day of the week. Why not just Genoa and sail straight to Southampton?’

  ‘Even riskier, I’m afraid. You will be travelling on false papers, Mr King. To leave Italy as an Italian family bound for England will cause suspicion. There’s a far better chance of success the other way. And we have looked into all the possibilities on your behalf, you know.’

  ‘Oh, how kind,’ Edward sneers and Bella says, ‘Edward! Will you please just listen?’

  ‘Thank you, Miss Stuart,’ the lawyer says and continues. ‘There are two sets of papers. One presenting you as an Italian family going for a holiday to Nice. I repeat, all the visas, documentation, passports, etc. have been taken care of - although we still need to take your photographs, but that’s a small matter which can be organized here. You are booked into an hotel for one week.’

  ‘A week in Nice? Why waste all that time?’

  ‘Of course, you won’t stay for the week, Mr King. You will have in your possession a letter confirming your reservation for a week. This can be shown at the border and can be verified with a telephone call. When you get to the hotel you will indeed register. Then the next day, as if you are simply going on an outing - you leave Nice. Leave a suitcase in the hotel, clothes in the cupboard and so forth, so as not to arouse suspicion. Then discard, better still burn, whatever Italian documentation you have. Go to the train station and catch the train to Paris and from there to Calais. Now you will be using this envelope.’ He lifts up the next package.

  ‘This time an English family, returning from holiday in France. There is a receipt from the Bristol Hotel in Nice, showing an English address, which corresponds with that on your papers. To be perfectly honest, the second set of papers is unlikely to pass muster in England nor would they on an English ship - they are certainly not as authentic as I would have liked, but no matter, once you are on English soil, all that can be sorted out. Your father, Miss Stuart, may be called on to identify you. I will give you a telephone number where a colleague of mine may be contacted, should the need arise.

  ‘So that’s the bones of it. The important thing is that we get you into France. Once there it will be easy to travel as an English family, the French being sympathetic to the English just now and the next few days will see so much confusion at train stations with everyone trying to bolt, you shouldn’t stand out too much. Should you agree, there are several details to go over.’

  ‘Hold on a second,’ Edward begins. ‘I have a question, ifyou don’t mind.’

  ‘That’s what I’m here for, Mr King.’

  ‘What happens if we’re caught?’

  ‘Well, that depends on where you’re caught.’

  ‘I mean here, in Italy.’

  ‘The answer is, I don’t know. The Italian papers are authentic - that is, they are not forgeries but were purchased from an actual family. However, you will be committing a serious crime and will be treated accordingly. My information is that the government is setting up internment centres until they decide what to do with those detained at the frontiers. There is also the possibility of being sent to a confino, that is sent off to live in the remotest of areas for a long period of time, where there are very few comforts, if any.’

  ‘Yes, thank you,’ Edward says, ‘I know what a confino means.’

  ‘Naturally, we would do all we could to get you out, but these laws are at an early stage, and who knows how far Mussolini tends to take them. As I’ve already said, if you are caught in England, the matter is not so serious; the worst that will happen is a few days’ detention while the authorities ascertain your real identity and are satisfied that you are not a spy, or some such.’

  ‘I see,’ Edward says.

  ‘I should add that it will mean leaving Italy tomorrow. I will give you some time now to talk matters over and make your decision.’

  ‘How long?’ Edward asks.

  ‘Half an hour. I’m afraid I need to know before returning to Berlin, which I must do as soon as possible.’ Edward abruptly stands up. The lawyer ignores him. ‘And there is something else. The Signora would like me to ask you to carry a sum of money, along with some jewellery. This is not my idea, nor do I particularly advise it, but she feels it may come in handy for your own use, or indeed for her use when she arrives in London. At the moment they are carrying out random searches at the border, but this time next week it will be a fine toothcomb for anyone leaving the country. So it’s your risk to take, and your decision to make.’ The lawyer begins to repack his attache case.

  Bella is quietly weeping. After a moment Sorella Ursula hands her a hanky. ‘I’m sorry, sister,’ she says.

  ‘It’s very understandable. Naturally, you are afraid.’

  ‘No, it’s not so much that. Not even that. I don’t want to go simply. I just never really saw myself leaving Italy, not like this. Not ever, I suppose.’

  Edward looks over at Tassi. ‘E Lei? Non ha niente da dire?‘ he asks.

  Gino Tassi makes no reply, kisses his baby and places her back in the arms of the nun. He lightly squeezes Bella’s shoulder as he passes for the door.

  *

  They get back towards evening. The priest drops them on the far side of Bordighera leaving a good half-hour walk back to Villa Lami.

  Sorella Ursula explains, ‘It is better if you walk from here, as if you are on an evening stroll. Tomorrow morning at half past six, I will come for you. Miss Stuart, please have Alec ready, and remember - prepare the baggage to seem like an authentic holiday. But for no more than one week.’

  ‘Yes, sister, I know. You told me.’

  ‘Yes, I did. Bring a bucket and spade, that sort of thing. And I know I told you that too, but I want to be certain - you understand?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You will not be taking the train from Bordighera where you are certain to be recognized, but we will drive you to a station further up the coast near where your papers say you live. This means of course that the train will travel back through Bordighera so be sure Alec makes no comment and keep him away from the window in case he is recognized. I will bring the baby tomorrow along with all her needs, also your documents and photographs which will be ready by then. I think that’s everything now. Yes, I am certain. Oh, and don’t forget your wedding rings. The steel band for Italy like a good fascist wife. Later the gold.

  ‘Yes, sister.’

  ‘The gold was the Signora’s from her first marriage - I told you that, yes. She thinks it will bring you luck.’

  ‘I don’t know the first thing about looking after a baby,’ Bella says.

  ‘You will learn and improve as you go along. Like all new mothers - eh? Like I have done in fact this past fortnight. Oh, and most important - your own papers. If you will both leave them in an envelope in the house for me, perhaps in your room, Miss Stuart. I will fetch them in a few days and send them on to you in due course. In case you are searched - you understand. You don’t want to have to explain who are Mr King and Miss Stuart on top of everything else. Goodness, no!’

  They get out of the car and Sorella Ursula rolls down the window. ‘
By the way, you must say nothing to Elida.’

  ‘Not even goodbye?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Please, sister. She’s my friend.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Miss Stuart, but it must be the way. In these times we can trust no one. Not even our best friend.’

  They walk in silence towards San Ampeglio. Early evening and an indolent sea. Edward keeps his face turned away. Bella decides it’s probably best anyhow if they don’t speak for a while. Her mind could do with a pause. All they’re expected to remember. All they still have to do. And here’s Edward meanwhile, quietly sulking, as he seems to have been doing for so much of the day.

  They cross the road and the church shows its head over the coast wall, roof peak and belfry. Behind it the ornate slab of the casino stretches towards the promenade. She can see the copper sway of the church bell but the ocean has sucked away any sound of its ringing. Down on the shingle beach: evening bathers on the rocks. A fishing line shimmers. The head of a diver smashes a hole in the water, leaving a deep white ruffle behind.

  Bella looks across to the other side of the road. The plinth for the long-disputed statue of Queen Margherita has finally been put in place. A shrine of flowers set out around it. She wonders how many more squabbles there will be before the statue itself arrives, then with a shock realizes she may never know, or even get to see it. She is about to say as much to Edward but then decides not to bother.

  Edward so angry with the lawyer; hurling obstacles and objections at every word that came out of his mouth. As if he’d been determined from the start to knock the plan flat out. And then so quiet over lunch. Mostly smoking. For once she’d eaten more than he - tiny white beans, knuckles of soft dark meat, cake made of chestnuts squelching with sugar. Even if she can’t seem to hold on to the details on her phoney papers, she can remember all this. The address somewhere in Imperia. Oneglia - is it? Or is that the name of the road, via Oneglia? The children’s names - Alberto and Edda, good fascist names. Edda after Edda Mussolini. Alberto is at least convenient for Alec.

  As for the English identity papers? All she can remember now is her name is Rose, her husband is James and that they’re supposed to be a family from Bournemouth - spelled incorrectly as Burnmouth.

  Edward so rude to Sorella Ursula. After they had finally given their answer and she had taken them downstairs and led them through cloisters and an ambulatory into the monastery barber. A proper barber chair where one pinkish head, freshly tonsured, was being merrily spanked with cologne. Nearby a beaming monk whipped up a bowl of froth and cast an eye over Edward’s beard. But Edward had refused him the pleasure.

  ‘I think it would be best,’ Sister Ursula had advised.

  ‘What difference does it make?’ Edward snapped at her.

  ‘It will attract less attention. It’s less…’

  ‘Less what?’

  ‘Less Jewish, I suppose is what I mean,’ she had quietly replied.

  Edward had turned on his heels. ‘We either get this photograph taken as I am, or not at all.’ He had stomped off then, back through the cloisters, Sorella Ursula trotting meekly behind him.

  So much for not getting riled! Bella glances at his face again as they cross the road towards the centre of Bordighera. Back to himself - back to nothing.

  They take the narrow route behind the Hotel Parigi and the backstage preparations for this evening’s dance. Waiters in shirtsleeves pass back and forth behind open French doors. Further along, through a small square window, a pair of hands arranges flowers. Outside, a band unloads instruments from a van. A woman, a guest, with a towel turbaned onto her head comes out onto a first-floor balcony and frowns at the sky. They cut across the piazza.

  ‘Would you mind?’ she begins. ‘Would you mind, if we walked a little way through town. I’d just like—’

  ‘Of course,’ Edward says.

  ‘Unless you want to…?’

  ‘No, this way is fine.’

  ‘You know, Edward, we may as well accept it - we really don’t have a choice. I mean, we can’t stay here, we can’t leave Alec and—’

  Edward nods and walks a little ahead.

  Shadows of last-minute shoppers and children stiff in new uniforms. Strollers, just like they’re pretending to be, talking about aperitivi. Outside the Terrasanta church there is a scatter of scarlet petals from an earlier wedding. A tram waddles towards them, they wait for it to pass, then a motorbike with a sidecar.

  ‘Hard to believe,’ she begins to say, but then stops.

  Outside Gabrielli’s, a woman shouts impatient instructions through the glass at an assistant in the window. ‘Questo, si, si, questo. No! No! Non quello, questo!’

  Edward leans over the woman and raps angrily on the window. ‘Questo!‘ He stabs his finger at the glass, pointing to a china bowl. The woman in the street stares up at him, open-mouthed. The woman in the window nods a wary thanks.

  Bella says it again as they turn right into via Roberto. ‘Hard to believe, Edward, that this is our last day here.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘So sudden. Isn’t it - so sudden?’

  They stop. Edward lights a cigarette. They are outside the tennis racket factory. The smell of wood and oil and paint through the open doors. Bella looks past him, at a view of the workshop interior. Splashes of soft light everywhere, on the pale wood of the workbenches and floors, the curve and turn of the rackets, the pegs where the frames hang all the way up the walls. She allows her eyes to stare for a moment. Then the man who made Alec’s last racket comes to the door, carrying a stack of tennis presses. He gives her a nod and smile of recognition. The smile that she returns feels heavy on her face.

  ‘Yes,’ Edward says as if replying to something she has asked, although she can’t recall what that was.

  They continue up the hill towards via Romano, and she begins to notice the amount of birds. Telegraph poles are studded with them and all over the rooftops and gutter rims more and more seem to be squeezing themselves in. A man walking towards them twists his neck to look back at the sky, raises his hands and laughs. ‘L’invasione delle rondini.’

  ‘What are they?’ she asks Edward, lifting her voice against their increasing din.

  ‘Swallows. Going south.’

  The nearer they get to via Romano, the greater the amount of birds, until the sky over the Hotel Hesperia is just one huge black trembling patch. The noise. A deafening rant of metallic squeaks and flapping wings. People are coming out of houses and hotels to look at the sky. A little boy ducks down onto his hunkers and lays his two hands flat over his ears. A woman opens her double windows and the ticking hedge of hysterical birds on her balconette explodes and scatters. She sees the woman’s mouth shape into first a scream, then laughter.

  They walk through the noise until eventually it starts to thin and they can hear themselves again.

  Bella tries a lighter approach. ‘You know, I will release you from your marriage ties as soon as we get to London. I mean, if that’s what’s worrying you.’

  She notices he’s only just finished one cigarette and is already fishing for another.

  Outside the Bicknell Library, he stops and lights it. ‘Bella,’ he says.

  ‘Yes?’ She closes her eyes.

  ‘I can’t.’

  ‘You can’t what?’ she asks, although in her heart she already knows.

  ‘I just can’t.’

  After a moment he speaks again. ‘Please, don’t ask me why. But I can’t risk going back into England. Certainly not on those bloody papers.’

  She looks up and down the road, then at him, then away.

  He says, ‘The best I can do is - maybe see you over the border but as soon as, I’d have to leave you. Not even as far as Nice. Perhaps Menton or maybe Monte Carlo.’

  Bella tries to speak but nothing will come past the sick feeling in her stomach.

  He takes another pull of the cigarette then throws it to the ground where he twists his foot over it. ‘I am sorry, Bel
la, and I wish it was otherwise but I just can’t take the risk. You see, I did something, a long time ago. I know you’ve guessed there was something. And I don’t want to tell you what it is, but it’s enough that you understand the moment I put my foot on English soil, I’ve had it.’ He runs his hands through his hair.

  ‘I thought you were Irish.’

  ‘Ireland, England, it’s all the same when it comes to this sort of thing.’

  She nods and bites into her lip.

  ‘For Christ’s sake. There’s nothing I can do about it.’ He raises his voice suddenly and she jumps. ‘I mean, that’s even if we get as far as England. Did you see the Italian papers they have for me? Did you see what they’ve put down as my profession, my job?’ He has her by the upper arms now and she shakes her head. ‘A carpenter, that’s what.’

  Bella blinks at him.

  ‘A carpenter, Bella. For fuck’s sake, look at my hands.’

  He drops his grip and shows his hands, smoother, whiter than her own.

  ‘They are so stupid,’ he says quietly. ‘They haven’t a fucking clue. A carpenter and his family travelling first class to Nice to stay in a hotel for a week. Jesus! Talk about looking for attention. Anyway, it doesn’t matter because once I get to England - that’s it.’

  He reaches out to take her arm and she takes a step back.

  ‘Please. I can’t tell you how sorry. How—’

  Bella feels her head repeatedly nod. ‘Coward,’ she says then and leaves him.

  *

  Coward. She nurses the word in her head all evening. As she tries to pack without Elida noticing. As she roots out all the jolly paraphernalia: swimming costumes and beach toys, sun hats and anything with a seaside stripe that happens to be in the house. Whatever it takes to convince the authorities that they are hip-hip-hooray holidaymakers. Coward. The word burns on and off her mind like a neon light, as she attempts to reassure Elida.

  ‘Please tell me, Signora, what is the matter?’

  ‘Nothing! Elida. Really.’

  ‘Where you were all day?’

  ‘I will tell you, Elida, in a day or two. Promise. You’ll know everything by then. But it’s nothing for you to worry about now.’