Once Night Falls

by Roland Merullo

  They were returning to the roadblock now; he could see it there, three hundred meters ahead. Instead of slowing down, he pressed hard on the accelerator, shifted back into fifth gear, sped up. Two hundred meters now. One hundred. With eighty meters to go, he felt the German start to squirm. “Attento,” the man said between his teeth—careful—and after waiting two more seconds, Silvio slammed his foot down on the brakes. The coupe went into a long, screaming skid, two thousand kilos of chrome and steel heading straight for the barrier. He saw the other officers at the roadblock scurry aside. A few car lengths from them, he turned the wheel sharply left, swinging the rear of the coupe around and bringing it to a stop parallel to the barrier, less than two meters from the terrified soldiers. He turned to look at his passenger. A bit of green there above the gray collar. Hands still clutching the sides of the seat.

  “Basta?” he asked. Enough?

  The officer nodded, made a strained smile, and, trying for the tone of authority and badly failing, said, “You are now free to go.”

  Yes, Silvio thought, and you are now free to clean the shit from your underpants.

  Thirty

  The train to Milan left from the Como station six times a day, exactly on the hour: 6:00, 9:00, 11:00, 2:00, 5:00, and 8:00. To save himself the uncertainty and expense of a bus trip, Don Claudio asked a farmer friend, Gennaro Masso, to take him there in his truck. It was a substantial favor—gas was as precious as silver then, and it was a ride of over an hour—but Masso was a friend of many years and quite well off, too. More important, besides Luca and the archbishop, Masso was the only person Don Claudio knew to be involved in the secret work. In a very quiet conversation on a Milan park bench, Archbishop Maniscalco had explained to him that the cells were designed that way: each partisan knew only two or three others, so that, even if he were caught and interrogated, the Germans would get, at best, a small number of names. It was, the archbishop had told him, “a web of trust.”

  On the day of his trip to Milan, Don Claudio rose earlier than usual, walked down the long hill into town, and arrived at Masso’s farmhouse on the southern edge of Mezzegra before the sun had risen very far above the mountains on the eastern shore. Masso was already waiting for him, sitting on the back edge of the open truck bed, chewing a stalk of celery. He offered a second stalk in greeting. They climbed into the front, set off along the statale, and soon found themselves behind a slow-moving line of German military vehicles. Masso kept his distance.

  “This is a great favor, Gennaro. I was sorry to ask.” Don Claudio turned to look at his friend: bald head, cleft chin, short, thick arms. Masso was one of the few people he knew who had retained the ability to laugh the way he’d laughed before the war, who somehow managed to stay optimistic, even happy, in the face of fear and deprivation. A truly spiritual man, he thought. A man who has faith in another world. And yet he was never seen at Sunday Mass.

  “For my priest and spiritual adviser,” Masso said happily, “no favor is too great.”

  They went on a short distance without speaking, the engine of the old truck grumbling and spitting, Masso shifting gears. To their left, sunlight sparkled on the surface of the lake. To their right, the forested hills folded in behind one another, up and up, toward the border with Switzerland. There were times, Don Claudio mused, when he forgot to appreciate the fact that he lived in one of the most beautiful places on earth.

  As they passed through the small village of Argegno, the vehicles in the German convoy pulled to the roadside, and Masso was able to pass. With luck, Don Claudio thought, he could make the nine o’clock train. Eleven was his usual meeting time with the archbishop; that shouldn’t be a problem.

  “Strange goings-on lately,” Masso said when they were on the open highway again.

  “Our beloved Duce, you mean.”

  Masso grunted. “That and other things . . . A few days ago, none other than an assistant chief of German intelligence for Italy made a trip up here to the lake and was sniffing around.”

  “Who told you that?”

  “Friends.”

  Don Claudio waited. This, too, was typical of the man. On the surface, a simple farmer, his face worn from years in the sun and his hands large and coarse, Gennaro Masso seemed, of late, to have mysterious sources of information, hidden “friends,” secret duties. Don Claudio wondered if he might be not simply a collaborator but one of the partisan organizers, the archbishop’s main contact, perhaps. Or if he was just a man who made it his business to catch every scrap of news that floated along the lakeshore. A tiny note of suspicion sounded in the priest’s thoughts. What if Masso . . . ? But that was another sin. One had to have faith, to trust.

  “What does he look like?”

  “Short, like me,” Masso said. “Fat, like me. Only uglier.” He put one hand up near the side of his head. “Huge ears.”

  “I saw him.”

  “Where?”

  “In front of Orlando’s. He stopped and asked me if I knew any saboteurs. Told me he’d pull out my teeth with pliers if he found I was lying.”

  “Your first interrogation.”

  “It was just one question, out on the sidewalk, in public. My legs were shaking.”

  “Natural enough, Claudio. Anyone would be afraid.”

  “Why would someone like that come here?”

  “Because right now, there’s more partisan activity here than anywhere in Italy. We’re on one of their main supply lines . . . You saw the convoy just now.” Masso focused on the road for a moment. Don Claudio could see that he had more to say. “Plus, two days ago, someone stabbed a Fascist Party member to death on a path in the hills outside Santa Eligia. Another friend of mine was hiking up there, looking for food, and came upon the body. He dragged it into the trees and found the Party ID in the man’s pocket.”

  “And told people this?!”

  “Told me. I’m telling you. You, I hope, tell nobody.”

  “Of course. I have a long history of secret-keeping.”

  “In the confessional, you mean.”

  “Yes,” Don Claudio said, and then he almost said something else. There were days when what he thought of as his “life’s secret” felt like a wasp in his mouth, stinging and stinging, desperate to get out.

  Masso glanced at him and then turned his eyes back to the road. “It’s a dangerous moment, Claudio. They’re all in a panic now, the Germans, trying to find il Duce before the king makes a deal with the Allies and they’re left to fight on their own. Our troops in Sicily are surrendering by the thousands. They didn’t want to fight, even while Mussolini was around. Now that he’s gone and the Americans have arrived . . .”

  Masso left the thought unfinished. Near the southernmost point of the lake, he took an exit for the city of Como and followed side streets to the station. He pulled up near the platform and turned to fix Don Claudio with his kind eyes. “Back tonight?”

  “Tomorrow, I think. I’ll take the bus, though. I’ll stop in if I have anything to deliver. Thank you for doing this, my friend.”

  Masso waved the gratitude away, and they shook hands. “Be careful now,” he said across the front seat, in a voice that made his passenger shiver.

  Don Claudio stepped out of the truck and watched Masso drive away. A web of trust, he thought. Masso, Luca, the archbishop, Maria, Rebecca, no doubt Sarah, too. All the good lives in danger now, and all of them linked to each other. One betrayal, and a trapdoor would open beneath their feet, sending all but one of them hurtling toward an agonizing death.

  But he sensed the tiniest sparkle of hope in the latest news: Duce gone, Fascists being murdered in the hills, the Allies in Sicily, Nazis in a panic.

  He wondered if there was actually a chance that good might eventually prevail.

  As he boarded the train, Don Claudio knew what to expect. The trip by rail to Milan took an hour and twenty minutes and passed through low hills at first and then flat, featureless territory that was a great disappointment after the scenery arou
nd the lake. In peacetime, whenever he’d had reason to travel to Milan, he preferred to say a rosary on that section and then sleep. He would awaken in Milano Centrale, in the massive station that seemed to have been built as a temple to the gods of steel and machinery, with people boarding and disembarking and visitors from all over Europe, indeed all over the world, crowding the platforms, ordering beer and panini in the cafés, hurrying off to visit the Duomo or the city’s many parks and high-class clothing shops, or making connections to Florence, Venice, Bologna, and points south.

  The doors closed, the first announcements were made. Tired as he was from rising so early, Don Claudio had the sense that the peace of sleep would elude him on this day. He began to run the beads through his fingers, mouthing the first few Hail Marys, nervous at his errand and working hard not to admit it to himself. “Be careful now,” Masso had said, and Masso clearly knew things that others did not.

  Just as the train left the station—exactly on time: they had Mussolini to thank for that, at least—the empty seat beside him was taken by a man whose accented greeting marked him as Austrian. He wasn’t wearing a uniform but had a military bearing, square shoulders, short hair. The man glanced at the rosary beads and frowned too obviously. Don Claudio turned to look out the window. For some reason, he felt instantly uncomfortable in the man’s presence and was at the point of feigning sleep when the stranger tapped him on top of his thigh. “A priest, yes?”

  Don Claudio turned to him and nodded.

  “Catholic?”

  No, he thought, Hindu. “Si, si.”

  “And you are traveling why?”

  The man, it turned out, spoke capable Italian, though with the thick accent.

  “Church business.”

  “Ah. May I inquire as to the nature of your church business?”

  Don Claudio wanted to say, No, you may not inquire. Or, In Italy we often introduce ourselves first, before we begin asking such questions. But this was another aspect of the war and the foreign presence, though it had begun, in fact, in Mussolini’s early years, before the Germans came: the rules of decent behavior had been suspended and new rules put in place. Behind the new rules stood the fist.

  “Of course. And I’m Don Claudio.” The men shook hands, but the Austrian didn’t offer his name. “In my order, the Dominicans, we’re required to make regular visits to our superiors. We confess our sins and receive absolution. We’re given direction as to the spiritual guidance of our flock. And so on.”

  “Ah. And is the guidance political?”

  “Not often, no.”

  “And have you heard the political news?”

  “Which news is that?”

  “Your Mussolini and so on.”

  “Yes, I did hear it.”

  “And do you have an opinion?”

  “Honestly, no. My work concerns the spiritual well-being of my parishioners. My interest is in the news of Our Lord not of our king or—” Dictator, he almost said. But he hesitated a fraction of a second and added, “Other leaders.”

  The man’s face showed no expression whatsoever. It was thin and sharp boned, plain as a warehouse wall, cold as concrete on a December morning. “But you thought Mussolini was a good man, didn’t you?”

  “He did some good things for the country.”

  “Brought order.”

  “Yes,” Don Claudio said. By torturing opponents and having his thugs beat or kill them, by controlling the press, by eliminating his enemies, by manipulating the people with his gift for speechmaking, by pitting Italians one against the other. “Sanatoriums, clean water, efficient trains. Many things.”

  “And now?”

  “As I said, sir, I have no idea and frankly, though I dislike war as much as anyone else, the focus of my thoughts and prayers is on bringing the peace of Christ to earth.”

  “So you approve of the so-called armistice your king is reported to be considering? In the name of this ‘peace’?”

  “I wasn’t even aware of it, signore. The king is a friend of Mussolini’s. I doubt very much that he’d do such a thing, since Mussolini would not be in favor of ending Italy’s involvement in the war.”

  “Do you approve of the recent attacks on German soldiers, the sabotage, the murder?”

  Don Claudio wondered if a trio of passengers on the other side of the aisle could hear these questions. He felt the muscles of his neck stiffen and a familiar shaking creep into his lower legs. It occurred to him that the Austrian might not have sat down beside him by accident, that the intelligence officer in front of Orlando’s might have been more suspicious than he’d seemed, might be having him followed. He had never been a very good liar. Be very careful, he thought.

  “Signore,” he said in as firm a voice as he could summon. “You are speaking with a Catholic priest. Harming others, killing others, destroying property, these things run absolutely counter to our faith. I’m surprised you would even ask such a question. And now, if you don’t mind, I’d like to continue with my prayers.”

  The man ran his eyes over Don Claudio’s face, then turned forward. He exuded tension, Don Claudio thought, as if he were clenching every muscle in his trim body, from toes to forehead. It was part and parcel of their philosophy: muscular strength, discipline, an absence of forgiveness. They cherished this idea of a master race, an idea that must, at all costs, be upheld by its practitioners . . . and then they’d devolve into nights of the most hideous debauchery. A strange thing, he thought, the way the human mind could form false systems of belief and cling to them in the face of the laws of love and the certainty of death. A whole nation could go suddenly insane. Two whole nations. He wondered how God could allow it.

  For a while, he was left to work his beads in peace. When he put them away in anticipation of their arrival in Milan, he looked out the window again, and his eyes were drawn to a beautiful green-and-white car, a convertible, racing along the road there at much too high a speed, cutting in front of a farmer’s truck just in time to avoid crashing head-on into a bus. Reckless, yes, but there was something beautiful about it, too, an absence of fear, a trust in one’s fate and the protection of the Lord. Don Claudio found himself envying a man who could drive like that, who could live like that. Beside him, the Austrian, emboldened or perhaps frustrated by his neighbor’s contemplation, said, “Do you know what my God is?”

  “I have no idea, signore.”

  The man suddenly took hold of Don Claudio’s left hand, grabbed his fifth finger, and squeezed the nail between two knuckles as if in a vise. Don Claudio let out a cry and managed, after a moment of struggle, to pull his hand away. The Austrian was grinning. He stood up to be first at the door but leaned his face down almost in the priest’s and hissed, “The ability to endure pain!” And he was gone.

  Gathering their belongings and standing up out of their seats, the passengers on the other side of the aisle kept their eyes turned away.

  Thirty-One

  On the overnight boat from the Italian mainland to La Maddalena, Mussolini held to a glum silence. He was used to action, decisions, work, and now he was being moved, against his will, into a new stage of life, almost like a man in his nineties whose family members had stopped caring about him and were placing him in a rest home watched over by nuns. Instead of nuns, he had his keepers on the Persefone. They were young and fit and looked good in their uniforms, but not one of them came anywhere near him. If he caught them looking in his direction, they immediately turned away.

  At daybreak, the ship slowed and angled into a narrow channel, cleared of mines, he hoped, with the island of Sardinia to his left and the much smaller La Maddalena Island to his right. The water was translucent, tropical greens and blues dancing in the early-morning sunlight. The sight of it, and the view of Sardinia’s low, stony hills, gave him a few seconds of pleasure.

  People talked about the draining of the Pontine Marshes south of Rome as being his major land-reclamation project, and that was true enough. But the idea had begun with
the Sardinians—a strange and mysterious people, renegades after his own heart—years before he came to power. The first marshes he himself had ordered reclaimed weren’t the Pontine but the swamps on the Terralba plains, not far from Oristano in Sardinia. He’d had three new cities built there, too, the first, Mussolinia, named in his honor. He’d drained the swamps, called in the best architects to plan the towns and construct beautiful public buildings that would remain monuments to his vision for hundreds of years. He’d provided hydroelectric power using the same water that had once been only a breeding place for malarial mosquitoes.

  Those were the kinds of marks he’d made on the Italian nation, and this was his reward: captivity, boredom, the captain’s “following orders” nonsense. The ship slowed again into the harbor and nudged up alongside a dock. The soldiers assembled, and their captive, the former Duce, was marched down the gangplank and along the stone pier like a murderer.

  Mussolini was wearing the same blue suit, crumpled now, in which he’d gone to visit the king. He kept his hat pulled down almost to his eyebrows. The captain had told him there had been air raids on some of the smaller islands off the western coast of the mainland. Evacuations, too. Perhaps that was why he saw so few people at that hour—two women washing clothes in the fountain, an old drunk sitting on his haunches in a doorway. They watched curiously, not recognizing him, it seemed, wondering who the stranger might be, unsure why he was being imprisoned, or protected, or at least held in a phalanx of soldiers on their quiet piece of sand and stone. Mussolini felt their eyes on him. In his inner ear, he heard Rachele’s Don’t go!

  He didn’t believe in introspection—a waste of energy—but as he walked along the dock and was led across a road and up a gravel path, he could feel the snake of regret slithering through his thoughts again. He hadn’t taken Grandi’s resolution at the Council meeting seriously, hadn’t worried about the warnings of his aides and family members, hadn’t felt the slightest concern about the intentions of the king. How could someone like him have made such a tactical error?