by Anthony Paul
Alfonso and Isabella are also in the glade. ‘We wanted to say goodbye, Roberto’ says Alfonso. ‘Hardly any Germans came through last night, and they’ve mined the bridge. God knows if they’ve mined anything else. Babbo reckons the English will be here tomorrow. Who knows what the future holds?’
‘It will be better’ Elvira says.
‘But for us?’ Alfonso asks.
‘For everybody.’
‘You’ll write to us?’ Alfonso asks.
‘Of course I will.’
‘And you’ll send me some toothpaste?’
‘Of course, Anna. Twenty tubes.’
Isabella laughs and smiles nervously at him. The smile fades as he turns to her. ‘Will we ever see you again, Roberto?’ she asks.
Both are embarrassed by the question and turn away. The others too are silent. It is the first thing Isabella has said and she has voiced a thought no-one had dared express, perhaps even think, until now: that deliverance from the dangers of the past few months, from the great fear, would be the end of what had bound them together. Roberto, who had become one of their families, would go back to his strange country and his proper kin, renouncing his new. He would once again be someone not from around here.
For all of them longing for the time of freedom had also been longing for their time of separation, but their thoughts were not quite the same. For the Golvi and the Giobellini families it would be the loss of a single son, a single brother. For Roberto it would be the loss of family, of neighbourhood, of a set of friends. When one has an all-consuming purpose its achievement leaves an emptiness which can only be filled by community. The families in Sannessuno would have that new common purpose, the rebuilding of the village and its spirit. Yes, there would be problems - the Golvis would have to do it while still grieving for Luigi, perhaps for Enrico too, and the Giobellinis would have to cope with the villagers’ hatred after the change of political power - but there would always be kin to help them and drive them on. Roberto would be going to something quite different.
Perhaps that - the utter strangeness of the community to which he would be returning, a community which would impose its different values on him again and alienate his new friendships - was what had inspired Isabella’s thought. Or was it? She had flushed and immediately turned away. Had she at last betrayed to all of them how close to expression the thought was in her, how keenly it was felt? Perhaps if Roberto had been less single-minded, had trusted her family sooner and been more prepared to accept her affection, he would have known better how she felt. Or how he felt about her. That might have headed off his night-time dreams. Had she had dreams too? Or was he once again misinterpreting her behaviour? He’d never had a sister. It was all too complicated and distracting. He still needed to be prepared for the dangers of tomorrow.
Isabella, still embarrassed, tries rephrasing the question: ‘You won’t forget us, will you, Roberto?’
‘Of course I won’t. How could I?’ He replies easily and then realises that he is almost confirming her fear.
Silence falls again. Elvira has been waiting for an opportunity and the need to change the subject is her chance: ‘You should give the Giobellinis a chit, Roberto’ she says. ‘I’ve brought pencil and paper.’
‘A chit?’
‘Porca miseria, Roberto, have you forgotten what a chit is?’
He looks at her blankly. She reminds him of the custom and hands him the paper. He looks at it, lost for words to write.‘I’ll dictate it for you: “Signor Natale Giobellini and his family… hid me from the Germans” ’ She stops to spell the words. ‘ “…and fed me many times from January to June 1944.” ’ He struggles writing the letters down. ‘Now sign your name and rank and number.’
He looks at her in disbelief. ‘You spoke English all along?’
‘My husband’s brother was a schoolmaster. Did you think we were uneducated?’
‘Why didn’t you tell me?’
‘You needed to become one of us, Roberto. How could you have survived if you hadn’t? But now you’re about to become English again, shall we speak English?’ He looks at her uncomprehendingly. ‘Perhaps when the shock has worn off. There are so many things you don’t know about us.’
–
In the afternoon he walks for miles in the sweating sun. Where his energy comes from in his skeletal body he does not know, but like an animal pacing its cage he explores the limits of his mountain, scouring each road, each valley and pass to the south for signs of the English army on the move. He listens for church bells pealing out the deliverance of a village, but there is no sound but the sporadic bursts of artillery duels to the south and birdsong in the hills. He sits on the top of the range and watches the sunset, a soft purple haze following the golden light up the mountain sides, and wonders if it is the last gloaming of occupation. As the sky reddens and fades and the hills turn different shades of grey and blue he returns to sleep in his hide, unfed. Maybe for the last time he checks his boots by his candlelight. Three times he has resoled them with the belting he took from the print-shop after the bombs, the but the soles are now holed again, separating from their rotting welts. Despite the constant use of Elvira’s tallow block the uppers too are holed and scuffed and torn. No German sentry could mistake them for English army boots now, but they have lasted, should last another day or two. He places them on his shelf amongst paraphernalia that have kept him going all these months.
Late in the evening Vincenzo wakes him. Nonna is dead.
45
‘Roberto! Come quickly! Roberto, wake up!’
He stirs slowly from his sleep, a sleep so deep after his miles of walking over the mountains the day before. Someone is shouting, a dangerous thing to do.
‘Porca miseria, why do you take today of all days not to wake up?’ The door to the hide is wrenched from its nails, allowing in the faint light of the early dawn. Vincenzo, his rifle in his other hand, drags him by the sleeve up to the spring, throws water in his face. ‘Now do you understand, Roberto? You’re so stupid sometimes. What do you hear?’
Birdsong, birds proclaiming the new day, the daytime when they will fly and fly from their roosts, free of care, searching their plentiful food. ‘Birds’ he replies.
‘And what do you not hear?’
He raises his face to the lightening sky. ‘Of course. The guns.’ He is like a bellringer so used to the sound of the bells that his ears hear no silence when the changes are over.
‘Their rearguard’s fallen back. It must have happened in the night. They’re gone.’
‘I’ve been so deep asleep. Have there been any explosions in the village?’
‘Just silence.’
‘So they haven’t blown the bridge yet. We’ve got to move quickly. Get everyone down to the spur, with the guns. It’s time to use them.’
‘I’ve already sent Ugo to do that. And Salvatore is fetching the doctor. The time for secrecy is past.’
‘I’ll get my gun.’
–
The early sun is projecting long shadows through the ruins of the village. People are up and about, slowly moving the way they have for months, resigned fatalistically to another hungry day of making ends meet.
‘They must still have units south of the bridge if they haven’t blown it yet, Vincenzo.’ Then they hear an explosion down the valley and from behind a row of poplars screening the railway two soldiers appear below them on a platelayers’ trolley, cranking the seesaw rig that propels it along the line. They stop, lay charges on the railway track and then move on. When they are a hundred yards on the charges explode, sending a burst of ballast and sleeper and rail through the air and echoes of the explosion off the limestone walls of the valley. They stop their trolley again and lay more charges.
‘They must be going if they don’t need that railway any more’ says Vincenzo. ‘It’s a pity they’re out of range of our rifles. We could stop them. And they’d be sitting ducks for your fighter-planes, wouldn’t they, Roberto? Why aren’t th
ey here? Surely the English commanders suspect by now that they’re retreating, will be destroying things? Why aren’t they sending fighters to strafe them? If only they’d sent us radios when we asked for them.’
‘Forget that. We’ve got to do what we can. And we’ve got to work out how they’re protecting their rearguard, so we don’t walk into a trap. They must have set up positions on the mountains north of the river to cover the men doing the demolitions. Mortars lower down, maybe field artillery higher up, probably near the road so they can move off again quickly when the job is done.’
‘There’ says Vincenzo, pointing to a thicket of brush near the road as it turns to take the col into the next valley. ‘That thicket wasn’t there yesterday. It must be camouflage netting. But they won’t be making a stand on that ridge. They’re just light field guns covering the retreat. So they’ve still got men down below. We’ve got to get down to the village while they’re still there. They won’t use that artillery if they’ve still got men inside doing demolitions.’
The doctor arrives, wheezing from his climb, unused to exercise. ‘We’ve got to move quickly.’ He takes off his spectacles, uses his scarf to wipe the steam from them, then his brow. ‘They haven’t blown the bridge yet, but there can’t be many more troops to come. As soon as they’re through they’ll blow it. They’ve already destroyed the bridges south of here.’
‘Have they mined anything else? Houses? Roads?’
‘I don’t think so, Roberto. It’s been so quick. They’ve been too busy doing the railway line.’
‘Probably for the same reason the Allied fighters aren’t here. Both sides are concentrating on the coast roads. Here the Germans are just falling back. There’ll be no battle here. We’ve just got to save what we can: the bridge, what’s left of the railway line. How many men have we got, doctor?’
‘Enough.’ He raises his eyes over the Englishman’s shoulder and Roberto turns. He has been too preoccupied with what is happening in the valley below to hear the growing hubbub behind him. There are now sixty skinny men on the spur, rifles and shotguns in their hands, bags of cartridges over their shoulders, some even with Italian army grenades hanging from their belts. He is startled by their numbers, the number of weapons that have survived hidden for so long, and more startled by the scarlet scarves around their necks, a uniform that had been unknown to him until now, so incongruous against their ragged clothes. Where had it all been hidden? And where had some of these men come from?
‘Give Roberto a scarf, Vincenzo.’ The Englishman steps back. ‘We don’t want you mistaken for the enemy, old friend, do we?’ Roberto looks back at the over-armed arrivals and roughly ties it around his neck.
The doctor and Vincenzo quickly give the partisans their orders. One group under Vincenzo to protect the bridge; one led by Ugo to attack the miners blowing up the railway; another by Salvatore to check that the German barracks are empty; another by the doctor himself to arrest the fascist sympathisers in the village and put them out of harm’s way in the school.
‘Including the Giobellinis?’ asks Roberto.
‘For their own protection’ says the doctor. ‘If you want, you can be in the party that arrests them. But I’d rather you were with the party going to the barracks, so you can help Salvatore if the Germans are still there.’
Salvatore points out a small group of German foot-soldiers labouring up the road north from the other side of the bridge. ‘We’ll take them.’
‘No,’ says the doctor. ‘Stopping the miners at the bridge is the most important thing. Stop them and the road north is clear. Stop them and we’ve got more of the village left to build on. We’d better get down there as fast as we can.’
The partisan band splits up into its sections and heads down different paths. ‘Hasten slowly,’ Roberto calls out, drawing his pistol, ‘there may be snipers.’
A shot from the village grazes Ugo’s arm. He slaps his hand to the blood and filthy cloth. ‘A few of them will die for that.’
–
The shot was a single one, but the fear of snipers has slowed down their various descents. All the way down women have emerged from houses, surprised at the sight of village men armed and on the prowl. ‘What’s happening?’ ‘The Germans are leaving. We’re going to fight them.’ ‘Good luck. Kill one for me.’ Here, there, an old man with his best felt hat on the back of his head stumbles out of his house clutching an old rifle he has hidden for years. ‘This lot are frightening me’ says Roberto. ‘God knows what will happen if they try to use those guns.’
‘You see why the fascist families need protection?’ asks the doctor. ‘There are twenty years of scores to settle. The way it was always done in these parts. That’s why we had to train the partisans. That’s why we wanted you to stay.’
Roberto remembers Natale’s words that he’d been kept here for the liberation day. Yet now his presence might save the old soldier’s life. He casts the thought away. He has to beware of snipers.
From the area of the bridge rifles crackle, there is a burst of machine-gun fire. Vincenzo is in action, has found the miners preparing to blow the bridge. ‘We’d better go and support Vincenzo at the bridge, doctor. Let’s hope Ugo does the same. It sounds quite a battle over there.’
‘But we’ve got to control the villagers with the guns’ the doctor protests. ‘Think what they’ll be up to while that battle’s going on. If we don’t get the fascists behind locked doors as soon as possible, until tempers cool, there’ll be a bloodbath. What a way to celebrate deliverance would that be? What kind of a start to peace and liberty? We’ve got to get the village under control.’
The sound of the bridge blowing up, rattling the buildings of Sannessuno for the last time, ends the argument. ‘That settles it, comrades, the Germans have gone. Let’s start the peace.’
–
It is the first time that Roberto has walked into the village in daylight, the first time he has walked freely in it. It is as if he is looking at it for the first time, its bare stone walls, its ornate iron balconies, its washing lines below them. And he is allowing its people to see him for the first time. It is suddenly a village of people again, passionate, vibrant, revived after a winter of trying not to feel.
He and two of the partisans are now at the Giobellinis’ door. The family comes out, each clutching a few possessions rolled in a blanket. ‘I’m glad it’s you, Roberto’ Natale says. He looks up at his neighbours, hissing down and jeering, their balconies are already festooned with every scrap of red or pink cloth they can find. ‘And we’ll have a chance to say goodbye.’
They walk to the school, their pace through the gauntlet of hostility slowed by the old man’s limp. Natale shudders as they enter its gates, wondering if its beam is to be used again. Roberto turns to the partisan running the new concentration camp, a man he has never met before. ‘These are people who have helped the partisans’ he says. ‘They have the doctor’s protection. Their safety is your responsibility. They will have a room to themselves, a good one, away from the other prisoners.’ He goes with them into their room. ‘It’s only for one night, Natale, until the partisan leaders can make it known how much you’ve done. I’m sorry.’
‘Don’t worry, Roberto’ the old man replies. ‘We’ll be all right, but I’m grateful you were with us walking through those streets. Now you must go back to your English army. An old soldier knows a young one’s duty. May God go with you.’
He makes to kiss his cheek, hesitates, falters to hold out his hand and Roberto seizes his with the same grasp as the old man had held his the first night they met. Caterina hugs him, kisses his cheeks and bursts into tears. Alfonso formally shakes his hand and steps back for Isabella’s farewell. She lurches forward, puts her hands on his shoulders, buries her face in his chest, then sobs ‘You’re going back to your English fiancee. I know you are. I’ll never see you again.’
He does not notice the revelation. Too much else is crowding his mind. Everything has happened so quickly
that he is unprepared for farewells. Natale’s words about rejoining his army are pressing him. Things must be beckoning him from there, but there are dangers still ahead. It is a soldier’s day.
He treats Isabella as a sister staying behind, holding her gaunt body to his own and kissing her forehead like a tender brother. ‘Get yourself strong again, Isabella. The dark days are gone. Freedom is here. Make the most of it. Of course we’ll meet again when my war is over. But I have to go.’ She turns and buries her face in her hands and as her father reaches for her and takes her in his arms he signals with his eyes that it is time for the Englishman to leave.
He goes back to the square. Already the village is celebrating its deliverance. The church bells are ringing with a joy more wonderful than on any Easter morning. Coloured cloths are bunted from every balcony and window. People who hours ago were rummaging in the ruins oblivious that it was not another day of occupation have found strength to flock to the square and cheer their liberators. Partisans are firing into the sky bullets they no longer need to save. Everywhere old people are hugging each other and bursting into tears, young men and girls who have seen nothing of each other since the Armistice are eyeing each other. All the cares of twenty years have melted in the hot sun. Sannessuno is a community again.
–
He finds Carlo giving orders to a small group. ‘Roberto! One of our brave liberators! But you must be on your way, I think.’
‘Where are Elvira and Anna?’
‘Back at the house. It’s the custom. You’ve heard about Nonna?’
‘I’m so sorry. My condolences and respects.’
‘It was her contribution to the struggle. As she saw it, Anna was the future, she the past. She sacrificed herself to feed the young. If we betray them in the peace we betray her as well. Oh that the English are coming so late. Two days earlier she’d have seen it was worth it. A week and she’d have lived. Maybe.’