The Lost Art of Second Chances

by Courtney Hunt

  “You could open the letter to Paolo,” Barb suggested.

  “No, it doesn’t feel right. Nonna put a lot of thought into this. I don’t want to ruin it.”

  “Do you want one of us to go with you?” Jenny offered.

  “Your wedding is just a few weeks away. If I go, I’ll go alone.” Lucy swallowed her nerves. She could do it. Excitement mounted as she considered the prospect.

  “So you’re determined to do this?” Barb asked.

  “How can I not honor my grandmother’s dying wish?” Lucy cleared away the dishes. The casserole dish was completely scraped clean. Her figure-conscious friends had eaten every bite. “In fact, the way I see it, is that I only have one more issue to solve—who’s going to care for Frankie while I’m gone?”

  Paolo

  Ali d’Angelo, Italy

  Summer 1943

  Ali d’Angelo, like many towns in Toscana, became a village in a time before memory. Nestled in a wide valley, on a broad tributary of the Arno, some thirty miles southwest of Florence itself, what began as a tiny village grew to be a thriving medieval market town. The rich, fertile land created prosperous vineyards and bountiful harvests. Eventually, all this prosperity drew unwanted attention and the locals built a fortified stone fortress on the highest hill, a strategic protection point for a tiny village that grew slowly. Like many villagers, they aspired to grow their village into a town and perhaps, one day, even a city. So, they decided to build a stone church worthy of their aspirations. Generations of Rossi benevolence granted the funds to decorate it with gorgeous Renaissance sculptures, statues, and paintings of saints.

  Now, the Allied bombers seemed intent on destroying all of it.

  Paolo LaRosa raked his hands through his hair in frustration. Thousands of such hamlets littered the countryside, each stuffed with priceless works of art. The Allies rained destruction down on all of it, desperate to drive their enemies back. Paolo wasn’t a fool. He understood the perils of war, understood the ideals the world battled over. Still, did they need to destroy everything in their path to victory?

  He’d suspended his studies at Yale to come and help secure the treasures of Italy. They’d done what they could in Florence, even building brick silos around the masterpieces there. He stared at the map, full of pushpins indicating where Allied command wanted the Monuments Men to go and to hide the Florentine masterpieces.

  “What’s in this Ali d’Angelo that’s so important?”

  “They have a thick stone church and an empty basement.”

  They arrived in Ali d’Angelo on a Tuesday, in a decrepit Army jeep leading a convoy of trucks. As they wound their way up the side of the hill, on a narrow road more akin to a goat path than a highway, they passed vineyards on the verge of harvest, the vines laden with glossy fruit that still hadn’t quite reached its potential. Away from the noise and bustle of the city, the bees droned and butterflies danced among the flowers. The contrast of the bucolic splendor with the hellish, reality of war jarred Paolo.

  They pulled up to the church just before sunset, the sky to the west streaked with coral and peach. Paolo and his men hoped the early evening twilight would conceal the true purpose of their activities. They would park their trucks and jeeps under the thick tree canopy and rest in the church, pulling out at first light. The elderly priest, resembling nothing so much as a snapping turtle with wispy cotton balls stuck to his bald head, met him at the door and Paolo jumped down to translate. Introductions were made all around.

  “I did not realize you would bring your own translator. I enlisted help of my own.” Father Torricelli gestured to a slim woman at his elbow, her face lost in the shadows at the back of the church. “This is Bella.”

  At the sound of her name, the girl raised her head. The shadows of the blue hour gilded her face. She smiled at them, her red lips shaded purple in the shadowy twilight. Paolo’s fingers twitched, wishing for his paint brush to capture her striking beauty. Her dark eyes met Paolo and Paolo’s nerves crackled from the awareness between them. Men clambered down from the trucks and the moment shattered.

  Bella helped the elderly priest to a pew in the back of the main vestibule of the dim, chilly church before leading them along the wall to the darkened Lady Chapel. Burlap flapped in the evening breeze and, in the sweeps of their flashlight, brightly hued jewel toned glass shards littered the floor.

  “The bombing knocked out the windows.” Bella said, her voice low.

  “But surely you have not been bombed?” Paolo’s commander asked. “There is little of military significance nearby.”

  “A bomb landed in a field less than two miles from here. It destroyed a portion of an ancient vineyard that always produced a lovely red wine.” Bella chuckled dryly before shrugging, ‘Perhaps the bomber preferred a white.”

  Bella led the men through the church to the Lady Chapel. In front of the altar, where an empty niche indicated the absence of a saintly statue, Bella shifted aside two pews and indicated a trap door with a wave of her hand. With difficulty, Paolo assisted several of the men to pull open the door. She slipped down the ladder, beckoning the men behind her. Paolo followed, just a few steps down the ladder into a subterranean chamber at least double the size of the church above.

  “The villagers had grand plans to turn this into a cathedral,” Bella said, her voice husky and low, rich with amusement. “So they excavated far more than necessary. I believe this will help to secure—whatever it is you mean to secure.”

  “Where do the villagers take shelter during the bombings?”

  “Most houses here have stone cellars, used mostly for cooling food. Those that do not enter the basement on the far side. But—” She strode several paces into the darkness and knocked on a stone wall. “—the wall separates them. They do not know the treasures are here.” She waved to a far corner and his watery flashlight beam illuminated burlap bundles in the far corner. “We already secured our treasures.”

  She crossed her arms, turning back toward Paolo, with her eyebrow raised. A ring glinted on her finger, illuminated by his flashlight. Married then. Paolo pursed his lips and turned away, pressing down on his disappointment.

  “Artwork, Mrs . . .?”

  “It’s Miss Rossi.” He glanced down at her hand and she flushed. “My fiancé is . . . still missing in action.”

  “I am sorry to hear it.”

  “He has been missing for nearly three years with no word or sign.” She shrugged again.

  Paolo glanced around the basement and smiled at her. “I believe this will work. I’m Paolo LaRosa, by the way. Nice to meet you, Miss Rossi.”

  She extended her right hand and he shook it. Though her fingers were cold, her touch shot a rush of warmth up his arm. She jerked back and pulled her hand from his grasp, clasping her hands in front of her.

  “The pleasure is mine, sir.”

  “Please call me Paolo. And yes, I believe it will do nicely.”

  * * *

  Over the course of the next several months, Paolo and his team drove truck after truck to the tiny hilltop town, stowing some of the greatest Italian art treasures in the dark basement of a medieval church and, eventually, also the warren of thick-walled caves around the town. The Rossi family aged their wine in the caves for centuries. Now, instead of the rich vintage, they cradled art and antiquities, patiently waiting for the end of the war.

  They packed what they could in wooden crates, stuffed with straw, in the hopes the packing would keep out the damp. Sometimes, they spirited the art away so quickly they would arrive with priceless canvases stacked like so much firewood, haphazardly piled into the back of trucks.

  Each time, Bella Rossi would greet the men and help to secure the artwork, wrapping burlap around treasures, her movements quick and efficient. One day, toward the middle of October, Paolo came upon her staring, entranced at a painting, illuminated only by the flashlight she held in her hand, awe and admiration written on her face.

  “I did not realize
you are an art lover, Miss Rossi,” he murmured but still spooked her. She started and the swinging flashlight blinded him. He dropped to sit on a crate, his palms over his eyes, seeing flashes as his eyes adjusted.

  “I come down here sometimes just to see the paintings.” She stooped to pick up the flashlight and considerately held the beam away from his still stinging eyes.

  “Like your own art museum?”

  She blushed and nodded. “If not for the war, I would like to study art at the university in Firenze, though Babbo did not support so much education for a girl.”

  “Do you paint?”

  “Not even a little. Just . . . admire.”

  “I see.” Paolo smiled. “I wanted to be a sculptor and I can paint a bit. When the war started, I was at Yale.”

  “An American art student? By your accent, I thought you were . . .”

  “I am from Venice, yes. But I was studying in America.” Paolo told her the story of how he came to work with the men seeking to preserve the world’s art treasures. “We have a duty to preserve these treasures for the generations to come.”

  “Isn’t this part of what we’re all fighting for?”

  Jack

  Applebury, Massachusetts

  Present Day

  “Jack, do you have the Mazetti file?” His father popped his head in his office door at half-past four, the late afternoon sunlight gleaming on his bald pate, his tie and top button already loosened for a long night of work. Jack shook his head as he donned his jacket and clicked off the desk lamp. “Where are you off to?”

  “Same place I always go on Monday afternoons,” Jack answered. His father rolled his eyes and shook his head.

  “Billable hours, Jackson! Time is money!” his father called as he waddled down the hallway to his far larger office at the end of the hall. Billable hours were the Hamilton bywords, the credo, the motto. For generations, every Hamilton man became a lawyer. His great-great-grandfather founded Hamilton & Hamilton and, over time, Jack’s ancestors worked themselves to the bone creating the respectable firm it was today.

  Jack hoped he’d be the last Hamilton man to endure it. His boys could follow whatever dream they chose. Jack hadn’t and regretted it all his life. If he hadn’t stepped aside for Andrew Parker, maybe he’d be Lucy’s husband. If he hadn’t buckled to family duty, maybe he’d be a history professor, with tenure and a closet full of lumpy cardigans with arm patches.

  For as long as he could remember, Jack’s life was a series of carefully crafted appointments. As a partner in his grandfather’s law firm, a good bit of his time was spoken for, either in court or drafting an endless series of documents. Since the divorce, he’d found time for two other things, teaching a law class at the community college and working pro bono for the residents of the local retirement home, Sunset Manor, every Monday.

  Jack closed his office door before heading out into the fresh air and sunshine. As had become his habit, after escaping the office he considered his prison, he drove to Plum Island and took a walk. He rolled up his suit pants and removed his socks and shoes before striding onto the beach, wiggling his toes in the cool sand. With the autumnal chill beginning to cool the late afternoon air, the sunbathers and kids had already gone home for the day. A few fishermen crested the dunes behind him, carrying buckets full of their catch, getting in early before the tides.

  At first, he stomped along the beach, thinking of clever retorts to toss at his dad, though he knew he’d never say any of them aloud. He walked until his legs burned and stood on a dune, staring at the edge of the Atlantic, breathing in and out, trying not to think and to calm down.

  A cutter skimmed past, catching the late afternoon wind in its sails. The canvas whooshed as it filled, bowing the navy blue sail out in front. The gleaming teak hull skimmed the waters. The lucky crew worked in unison to reach the open sea. Where were they off to? What exotic port of call was next? What adventure was over the horizon for those lucky sailors not landlocked and chained to a legal career?

  If only he’d followed his bliss, as they say on the left coast, and become a sailor, like in the Jimmy Buffet and Kenny Chesney beach bum songs he played every morning. He couldn’t imagine himself as an island bum. He knew that it was an illusion. Their lifestyles were one more carefully crafted commercial persona. Still . . . he would love to follow them to freedom.

  But Hamiltons did not go to the islands and become beach bums.

  If it weren’t for his boys, he might do it for a season at least. Just quit the firm and head to the islands. He laughed to himself as he imagined his hair long and braided into rows, woven with seashells. He’d be tan and firm, without the soft layer of fat he’d gained in office life. He would sail all day, giving tours of the islands, and sleep under the stars in a hammock on the deck of his boat.

  His mother, in a morphine haze as breast cancer consumed her insides, used to tell him about how, whenever she drove into the city, she’d always be tempted to drive to Logan and get on the next plane. Just leave and escape it all.

  It seemed everyone had escape fantasies in life.

  Of course, that never worked, did it? Even if you could escape your place, you could never, ever escape yourself.

  Nonna Belladonna used to tell him that.

  He sucked in the salty tang of the sea, doing the deep breathing he’d learned in Jenny’s childbirth classes. As he blew out his breath, he thought of Nonna, coming to see him at his office, just weeks ago. When she’d come to the office, she’d been healthy and spry but maybe she’d felt time closing in on her. He’d seen it before, in his work at Sunset Manor. Seemingly healthy men and women would call for his services, get their affairs in order, and be dead within a few weeks. Did Nonna know somehow? Get some supernatural signal from the beyond?

  Toward the end, when the doctors gave up, his mother began relying on crank cures and wacky internet hoaxes. When he’d gotten angry and frustrated with her one day, accusing her of believing in woo-woo stuff, she’d said he needed to learn to believe in what he couldn’t see. Anything was possible.

  He hadn’t heard from Lucy since his visit to her to pass on Nonna’s bequest. He wanted to go with her to help her fulfill Nonna’s last wish. When Nonna asked him to go with Lucy, she hadn’t shared the details of her last request with him though. He hadn’t realized it would be so complex and so difficult. Would Lucy go to Italy? Should he go with her? Would they be able to find this Paolo LaRosa? And perhaps most important to Jack, would she find the lover he’d heard her ask for?

  As the sun dipped toward the horizon, he headed to Sunset Manor. He drove up the curving gravel drive, parking under the sprawling oaks shading the lane and parking area in front of the converted mansion. Rest home. What a joke. The residents there weren’t resting at all. Instead, they all fretted over what didn’t get done or the family breach that couldn’t be mended or the bucket list items they failed to check off.

  He did pro bono work there twice a week to help the residents draw up wills or with any other legal issues. So many of the elderly died intestate leaving the state to eat up their meager resources. The history buff in him loved to listen to his friends’ stories, to learn their histories and life stories, all about to pass out of living memory.

  He strode in to the spacious foyer, waving to the front desk clerk and headed to see his favorite residents, Don and Owen. Tall, thin Owen and stooped, mustached Don, both widowers, roomed together. They spent most of their time together bickering and playing endless board games. Tonight, he found them in the lounge, playing chess.

  “Don, you’re cheating again,” boomed Owen before breaking into a hearty laugh.

  “I am not!” Don answered in his squeaky, wheezy voice, long wrecked by emphysema. “That’s a special exception.”

  “Might be how you all played chess down in Southie but . . .”

  “Not from Southie.” The two friends laughed together again. Jack stopped at their table.

  “If it isn’t Lawyer J
ack!” Owen cried, patting the chair next to him. “Have a seat.”

  “Good evening, fellas. I’ll only sit for a bit. I have several appointments tonight.”

  “Rushing around is no good for you. Sit a spell.” Jack smiled and dropped into the chair next to them. After a few moments, Don continued, “Jack, I wondered if I could ask you a question. It’s about my family farm. It’s up in New Hampshire, just over the state line. We used to grow the most beautiful apples up there.”

  “And pumpkins too. He showed me pictures.” Thus reminded, Don pulled out a small photo album—the smartphone revolution hadn’t reached here—and pressed it into Jack’s hands. Dutifully, Jack flipped through the pictures and admired and exclaimed over prize pumpkins and goats. As the pictures passed, he saw Don as a young man, with a pretty wife by his side, and a little boy seated atop an enormous pumpkin.

  “That’s my Richard. He was so proud of that. We carved it into a Jack-o-Lantern. He was only about three there, so tickled he could stand up in it and peer out.”

  “I didn’t know you had a son, Don,” Jack said.

  “I did. He’s still in Vietnam,” Don murmured, pushing his glasses up on his face.

  Owen winced and waved at the chessboard. After a pause, he said, “We goin’ to finish this game?”

  “Yes, but, just let me ask Jack a question first. After we gave up hope of Richard ever coming home, the heart went out of my wife. We sold most of the farm and packed up and traveled some. Cancer got her soon after that. Anyway, I wondered whatever happened to the farm and if you could tell me.”

  “Of course. Let me get a few details.” Jack took a few notes and stood to go, just as he made a decision of his own. “It might be a few weeks before I get back to you, Don. I’m going to Italy.”

  “Is it about a girl?”

  “Aren’t all the best journeys?” Jack smiled at his friends and headed off to work.

  * * *