by James R Benn
A whining, insectlike noise intruded upon the others. The orderly, steady movement of the column changed to a panicky revving of engines. Shouted commands, voices tinged with fear or anger or both raged up and down the road. I saw a truck fly by us, crushing small trees as it charged off the road, looking for a place to hide. The whine increased, and I knew it was the sound of fighter planes, lining up to strafe the convoy. And us, since by now parts of it engulfed our little cart.
Sharp rat-a-tats repeated themselves as the planes-two of them, maybe-sent machine-gun bursts into the column. A faint ripple of half-hearted return fire rose from the road, but two massive explosions smothered it. One was incredibly loud, a sharp thundering blast that nearly lifted the cart up off the ground, likely a hit on an ammunition truck. The other was less contained-a whump that sounded like a truckload of gas cans igniting. The crackling fires, shouted commands, and the moans of the wounded were the only sounds after that. Engines turned over, gears shifted, and the smell of gasoline and burned flesh mingled in the warm air. I heard somebody crying, but no sound of returning fighters.
German soldiers walked through the trees, some calling out names, others laughing with the relief of being alive. It was a nervous kind of laugh, the same in any language: a little too forced and high-pitched, a false joy trying to seal off what has just happened and what could happen in the next minutes, hours, or days. An engine revved high, followed by a crunching sound as a vehicle was pushed off the road. Treads clanked and I knew tanks were going by. If I remembered my briefing correctly, from the Fifteenth Panzer Grenadier Division.
" Oliven? Olive? " A German voice, then two more joined in, asking Salvatore about the baskets. Blurs of khaki passed by and I heard Salvatore and Sciafani protesting to the Germans.
" Mircatu, mircatu, " Sciafani answered. " Mi dispiace, no. "
I figured he'd said that they were meant for the market, and he was apologizing. From the scuffling, I sensed more Germans gathering around. If they searched the cart I was done for. Salvatore and Sciafani would be shot on the spot and I'd be lucky to end up in a POW cage with a cracked skull. I closed my eyes and tried not to move a muscle, feeling the sweat drip over my face.
" Olive siciliane, molto buone, " I heard a German say slowly and proudly, as if he'd mastered a difficult phrase. It didn't sound like a search party. I eased open one eye and saw the barrel of a Schmeisser MP-40 pointed at me. But it was slung over the shoulder of a Kraut who was standing sideways to me. In his hand was a bunch of lire. They wanted to buy the olives. I almost laughed out loud. Minutes ago they'd almost been killed and now they were shopping for roadside treats, lined up like obedient children.
" Olive, no, " Sciafani barked. " Mandorle dolci, si. "
Dolci? Didn't that mean sweet? I didn't know the other word, but I figured it out as soon as Sciafani dug his hands into the loose almonds and began giving each German a double-fisted handful.
" Grazie, danke, " I heard over and over.
" Lire, no, mi amici, " Salvatore said, giving away the almonds to his tedeschi pals.
By the time they were done, the level of almonds was down a fair bit, but the Germans bid friendly Auf Wiedersehens as they climbed onto the last of the tanks. Sciafani had played that one smart. I was glad more Krauts hadn't stopped by or else he would've come up with a fistful of me pretty soon.
"That was close," Sciafani said, after the last of the vehicles had passed.
"Do you mean the Allied strafing or the German soldiers? There's so much to chose from."
"I would say the Germans. They were closer. Do you need to get out for a few moments? It looks safe."
"Yeah, I gotta see a man about a horse. Pull me out, willya?"
They each reached in and grabbed a leg. Almonds poured out with me and I had to grab onto Sciafani to keep from falling as the circulation came back into my legs.
"A horse?" he asked.
"It's an American saying," I explained as I walked to the nearest tree.
" Pisciarsi addosso dalla paura, " Salvatore said, and they both laughed.
"You must not have been too scared if you have that much left," Sciafani said.
"I'm glad you boys are enjoying this," I said as I finished up.
Walking back to them, I saw figures come out of the woods and head for the wrecked German vehicles. They both followed my glance. Salvatore retrieved his lupara from where he'd hidden it. There were about a dozen people, some of them women. The men were armed with shotguns, German Mausers, Italian Mannlicher-Carcano carbines, and pistols. They were all ragged, their clothing dirty and patched. The women stripped the dead Germans where they lay in a row at the side of the road.
"Bandits," said Sciafani, the smile gone from his face.
"Mafia?" I asked. Salvatore shot me a glance then returned his gaze to the nearest group of men.
"No, mafiusu do not look like that. Bandits. There is no time to hide, we should leave now."
It was too late to leave. Three men had detached themselves from the group and were walking toward us. One held an automatic pistol- a nice Beretta, it looked like. The other two were armed with short Italian carbines. Salvatore stood still, his right hand on the leather strap of the lupara that hung from his shoulder.
Harsh words and angry gestures came from the guy with the Beretta. He pointed to the cart, then the donkey. I thought he was going to shoot it, but then understood. He was saying it was his now. He waved his hand toward the road. Maybe he was in a good mood today, and we could go free, simply leave the donkey and cart behind. Or maybe he preferred shooting his victims in the back. He looked the type-narrow little eyes, a broken nose, and crooked teeth rotted nearly black. I'd want to shoot somebody too if I looked like that.
At about ten feet, they were too far away to rush. It didn't look good, but Salvatore didn't say a thing as he stood his ground. Sciafani looked as worried as I was, and took an involuntary step back, holding his arms out at his side, palms out. None of the three bandits had their weapons pointed at us. There was still the threat of Salvatore's lupara, and they seemed to prefer that he walk away with it. Silence filled the space between us as the man with the Beretta raised it, a half-threatening gesture that went nowhere. I could see Salvatore lock eyeballs with him, and very slowly lift his left hand to his shirt. The other men shifted their weight, but the movement was so deliberate that it didn't surprise them into action. He unbuttoned the top button, then the next, then another, until his shirt fell open. Now it was the bandit's turn to take that step back. I couldn't see what was on his chest, and thought it best not to move into the line of fire for a better view. The two men with the carbines took another two steps back, lowered their rifles, and took off. The Beretta guy with the bad teeth stood with his gun hand still half up, looking too mean too run, too uncertain to shoot.
" Cazzo! " He spat out the curse as he raised the Beretta. In one fluid motion, Salvatore pulled on the leather strap with his right hand and the lupara appeared in it, a blast from both barrels knocking the bandit onto his back, two neat blackened holes, seeping red, right over his heart. As he reloaded Salvatore walked over to the dead man and picked up the Beretta. He found a spare clip in the man's jacket pocket and brought both over to me.
The other bandits stood quietly at a respectful distance, their weapons slung over their shoulders. The grove of trees was quiet as the coppery smell of fresh blood rose from the ground.
Salvatore handed me the Beretta and the ammunition clip. " Un regalo," he said.
I was too busy reading the tattoo on his chest to react. In a bold arc across the top of his chest were the words VIVA LA MALAVITA. "What does he mean?" I asked, looking at Sciafani.
"A gift, he is giving it to you as a gift."
" Grazie, grazie, " I said to Salvatore with sincerity. "But what does this mean?" I tapped on the tattoo. Salvatore smiled and buttoned up.
"Long live the underworld, the life of crime. It proclaims who he is, a man of honor."
I watched as the band of bandits made their way back into the woods, carrying German boots and uniforms and other debris the convoy had left behind. They could have massacred us. But they were afraid, afraid someone would see, or simply afraid of killing a mafiusu.
"He's a member of the Mafia," I said.
"It is only the newspapers that use that word, although it has become more widespread now. The entire purpose of the organization was to be secret. It was never really named. You have heard of c osa nostra?
"
"Sure," I said. "That's another name for the Mob."
"Here in Sicily, it is called a society. And members of that society refer to it as 'our thing.' Which translates as cosa nostra. So you see, there is no real name for it, other than the labels outsiders create for it. The life of the underworld. That is what it is."
"How do you know so much about it, Dottor?"
"Let us bury you again, Billy, under the almonds."
"Are you part of cosa nostra? Are you mafiusu? "
"You ask too many questions. In Sicily that can be unhealthy," Sciafani said.
"It's been nice getting to know you so well, Dottor," I said as I slipped into the cart and pushed away almonds from my hiding place. "How far to Agrigento?"
"Two or three hours, if you do not have to see a horse again."
"See a man about a horse," I corrected him as I pulled the blanket over me and they piled on the almonds.
I was certain there was something Sciafani was keeping from me. I didn't know what it was, but I figured it was about his past, reaching back into his childhood. What worried me was why he would bother lying about anything to me. What could it possibly matter?
I may be nuts, I thought to myself, but I felt a whole lot safer with the Beretta in my pocket. I might be nuts? It would have been funny if it had not been such a distinct possibility.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
I spent the next three hours thinking about the last time I had been in Agrigento, or at least what I could remember. It was a bit hazy. I had met Nick Cammarata before the mission. He was a Naval Intelligence officer, recruited for his knowledge of Sicilian. He'd been born in the States, but his parents had emigrated from Sicily so he'd grown up speaking the Sicilian dialect at home and English on the streets of Brooklyn. There was even a village with the family name somewhere in the mountains, not far from Villalba. Nick had hoped he could get there when the shooting was over to look up his aunts and uncles.
Some navy commander had brought Nick and four other agents to Allied Forces HQ a month before the invasion. They each had a different mission. Nick had been paired with me, since Uncle Ike wanted to keep tabs on the Mafia angle. The whole thing had almost been called off when one of the guys let slip he'd been brought to the attention of the Office of Naval Intelligence by Joe Adonis, head of the rackets in Brooklyn, who worked for none other than Lucky Luciano himself. While some of the brass was nervous about the Mob connection, others would have been glad to shake hands with the devil himself to get the upper hand in this invasion. Uncle Ike wasn't sure either way, except I remember him telling me how Don Calo's cooperation would save lives.
I could see Nick's face, but no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't place him on this island. The last thing I remembered was seeing him on the deck of Harry's MTB, leaving the dock in North Africa. Harry's face came to me easily enough, especially that last moment when he came into view rounding the stone column before the grenade exploded. I could feel the cool darkness of the night and the pressure of the explosion in my eardrums, see the bright flash, and hear the frantic yelling in Italian and English. Had Nick been there? How had we ended up at the Valley of the Temples, shooting up the ancient ruins? Had we been betrayed?
English. If there had been yelling in English, it must have come from Nick. Harry would have been standing right where the grenade went off. The cry I'd heard hadn't been one of pain, it was more controlled and urgent than anguished. What had Nick been saying?
Nothing came to me and I tried not to think about it too hard. That was the best way to remember. Let it roll over in your mind a few times, my dad used to say. Your mind is busy all day, he'd told me, so don't expect too much of it. It's got a lot to handle, so let the problem roll around in there for a while, and maybe your subconscious will earn its keep. It doesn't have anything else to do.
My dad said a lot of things. Some of them made great sense, and some were just to have something to say. Others I wasn't sure about. This was one of those, but I had to give it a try. So I thought about something else.
The note. The note about purgatory and happiness really bothered me. It matched a message Nick had been given for his Mafia contact, a code of sorts that only a Sicilian would understand. A Sicilian from around Agrigento. That little village of Cammarata was no more than twenty miles north of here. Nick wouldn't have needed to keep it written down, so how had that piece of paper gotten into Rocko's hands? More important, how had the message itself been communicated? The only people besides Nick who would have possessed this information were in North Africa, unless you counted the Mafia contact who had passed it on in the first place. Which was interesting, since the mafiusu were in the mountains and Rocko would have been stationed at the beachhead. I couldn't figure that out either, so I took my father's advice again and let my subconscious work on it.
Late in the afternoon we climbed a steep hill, the donkey clip-clopping up switchbacks slowly. Salvatore and Sciafani both got out of the cart to lighten the load. Lucky me, I got to stay buried under the almonds. We pulled off the road, and Salvatore unhitched the donkey to let him feed on the grass.
Sciafani lowered the rear of the cart. "We are almost to Agrigento.
Look."
I got out, thankfully for the last time. I brushed almonds from my clothes and tried to straighten up. As I did, I saw Agrigento, the setting sun hitting its walls, turning them to gold as shadows reached like greedy fingers across the rooftops. It was a beautiful city set high on the next hillside, a small valley of green split by a wide stream beneath it. I could hear church bells chiming the hour.
Salvatore closed up the cart as he and Sciafani exchanged words. I shook his hand, said Grazie, and smiled. He gave me a little salute and then went to tend to his donkey.
"We should wait until dark before we enter the city," Sciafani said.
"Salvatore must go to his relatives now. It is too dangerous for him to take us further."
"Where should we-" Sciafani stared at something over my shoulder, and I turned to see what he was looking at. A cloud of dust kicked up from the road down in the valley, and the sound of an engine downshifting painfully and straining up the hill toward us echoed from below. He grabbed my arm and pulled me behind a line of thick shrubs. We flattened ourselves and waited. Salvatore held on to the donkey as he stood in the open, his shotgun hung carelessly from his shoulder, his lethal speed hidden by a posture of peasant lethargy.
An ancient truck heaved itself up over the crest of the hill. It had no military markings but was crammed full of khaki-clad soldiers standing in the back and on the running boards, hanging onto the truck, grasping short Italian carbines.
"Fascist militia, MVSN," Sciafani said in whisper, even though at this distance, with all the noise the truck was making, he could have yelled it.
The truck stopped as soon as the road leveled out, and the soldiers burst into activity, handing down cases of ammo from the back of the truck, and lifting out a heavy machine gun and tripod. An officer, his dress uniform complete with the official Fascist black shirt, stepped from the passenger seat and scanned the horizon with binoculars. He looked east, to the left of the city, which I judged to be due south of us. "We must be making a move," I said, my voice a whisper now that the truck was silent. I imagined GIs advancing up that hill into machine-gun fire.
Then I thought about Sciafani. Fascists or no, these were his countrymen. There was still no "we" between us, no matter how friendly
he'd been. I wondered if he would want to stay with them, to tend their wounded, if it came to that. I wondered if he was tempted to turn me in. I glanced at him but his expression gave nothing away. For the first time, I felt a shiver of mistrust. Sciafani had been a willing traveling partner at first, but after the encounter with Vito Genovese and Legs, something had changed. Was it seeing the German shoot Signor Ciccolo? Perhaps. But there was something mysterious about the story of Sciafani being adopted, especially after all the talk about trusting only blood relatives. I realized he was here for his own reasons. They coincided with mine for now, but I needed to pay attention and be alert to any change.
The Blackshirt pointed at Salvatore and yelled. Two soldiers marched over, waving their hands for him to leave. He argued with them, gesturing from his cart to Agrigento, probably complaining about not getting to the market. They shook their heads, and he resignedly hitched up the donkey, complaining the whole time. He did a good job of maintaining their focus on him as he moved away, keeping up a stream of Italian that sounded like insults mixed with bewilderment. As he passed our hiding place he winked.
We watched the militiamen set up the machine-gun emplacement. There were about twenty of them. They dug foxholes on either side of the road and a firing pit protected by sandbags for the machine gun. Off in the distance, to the east, a dark plume of smoke appeared. The officer turned his binoculars on to it, then got into the truck and took off, back down the hill. For reinforcements maybe.