The Breach

by Chrystyna Lucyk-Berger

Pietro stood up and turned towards the door. The Colonel came in, looking ready to do battle, white gloves in hand, but Pietro took a step forward and gave him a careful embrace.

  “Nicolo, we’re all here as concerned citizens, and as family. Let’s remember that.”

  Angelo stepped from behind his desk and gave the Colonel a brisk handshake. When they were all sitting, he corrected Pietro. “Today’s meeting is strictly a department matter. You’re here to consult. And you”—he eyed the Colonel—“are here to get a summary of our findings.”

  The Colonel whipped his gloves against his thigh once, then stuffed them out of sight.

  “I have the watchman’s report here,” Angelo said.

  “That he survived,” the Colonel said, “is a miracle.”

  “It was luck. He was at the other end of the dam. We already had concerns about the water levels, as you know, at the opening. Especially after all the rains. On November thirtieth, he called my risk assessor, but my man assured him there was nothing to worry about yet.”

  “Thirty-eight metres,” his father said.

  “Correct. The dam broke the next day at seven oh five in the morning. About fifty minutes later, the last wave was reported in Darfo, at the end of the valley. According to the watchman, the buttress collapsed very fast—he guessed thirty seconds—and in three stages. The eleventh spur fell first along with the two arches resting on it, followed by spurs eight to twelve and then four to seven. Overall, a breach of about eighty metres.”

  He handed copies of the report to each man, summarizing the rest. “Subsequent technical examinations have proven that the collapse was triggered by water seepage at the interface between the masonry base and the overlying structure. Your structure, Colonel, for which we never issued permits.

  “Many aspects have contributed to the failure of the multiple-arch dam, but ultimately the blame lies on poor workmanship. The concrete arches were reinforced with anti-grenade scrap netting.” He waited until the Colonel looked up from his copy. “Anti-grenade scrap netting? I find that to be rather remarkable considering that you complained about those materials when we were on the battlefield.”

  He took a deep breath before continuing. “The worst of it was that the dam was poorly joined at its foundations, and evidence of poor masonry was also found. This along with those accumulated rains created perfect conditions for the disaster.” He paused, certain to have the Colonel’s attention. “We also heard from people who worked under Barbarasso. They claim that he fired anyone who complained about poor construction techniques. Secondly, my men were eventually on your payroll, lining their pockets with your bribes.”

  The Colonel remained unusually silent.

  “What findings does Grimani Electrical have at hand?” Pietro asked.

  His father grimaced. “If we have to pay for all the damages alone, the company will be insolvent.”

  Angelo steepled his hands. His father was not going to get out of this that easily, but there would be no more dams for Grimani Electrical for quite some time. He would get concrete numbers later.

  “I am going to make changes to how we do things.” He opened a folder and placed two documents before Pietro and the Colonel. The men leaned forward to read them. “One report is from the Geological Society in Munich, from a Richard von Klebesberg. He conducted the original geological tests and soil samples of the Reschen Lake decades ago. Then again about three months ago.”

  The Colonel looked up, and Angelo flashed him a warning look to let him finish.

  “The report reiterates von Klebesberg’s original findings. The soil is too porous. If you build a reservoir there, you’ll create a wasteland when the waters recede. In other words, the valley floor will become a desert, and with that wind tunnel the valley creates, the sediment will spread and cover the remaining crops.”

  “But this one here…” the Colonel pointed to the second page. “This one contradicts that report.”

  “Yes, it does. The samples sent to Rome by my geologists have come back stating that the ground tests are clean. There could not be a more ideal spot for Grimani Electrical’s next dam.”

  He heard Pietro suck in his breath. “That was not a wise move, Angelo. Does Rome know that you ordered samples to be conducted by German geologists?”

  Angelo frowned. “No. And why should they?” He eyed the Colonel. “I want to know what I’m up against if I’m to do the job you got me in here for.”

  “That’s treason, Angelo,” the Colonel threatened.

  He shrugged. “Then report me.”

  His father leaned back, looked at Pietro, and found no accomplice there. “What are you planning to do next?”

  “I want to appeal the permit for the dam in the Reschen Valley. The one your consortium managed to get.” He held up a hand when his father began to protest. “I know how vital it is. I’ve read all the reports, and we’ve been discussing this for years.”

  “Debating is more accurate.”

  “Come here.” He stood up and went to the table where the model of the Reschen Valley was. The Colonel stood a distance away from it. “You see this?”

  “You forgot the third lake,” the Colonel muttered.

  Angelo allowed himself the satisfaction that his father was sulking. “Come now, Colonel. Even the engineering department in Verona is against your plan. Their damage reports match mine, and I still don’t have a good answer about what we’ll do with the people living here and here.” He pointed to the hamlet of Spinn and the outskirts of the two larger towns. The Italian officials’ barracks, ironically, would be right on the reservoir’s shore.

  Pietro stepped forward and swept over the northern area of the model. “With your plans, Nicolo, all of these hamlets and villages would be wiped out. Even the higher ones, like this one.” He indicated the model of Arlund.

  Something stuck in Angelo’s chest, and he felt dizzy. The nightmare, the valley floor rising with water, his despair. The panic washed over him, then receded. He went back to his desk. The other two followed him and took their seats again.

  He addressed the Colonel. “You can’t move almost two hundred grain farmers to higher ground and hope they can restart on the mountainsides. We’re looking at one hundred percent losses to farmland and ground for livestock. Verona has doubts they’ll be able to skirt the laws on this.”

  His father scowled and reached into his breast pocket. When he had his black notebook out, he took the pen from Angelo’s desk and said, “Verona has a problem with my plans, you said. Who would that be?”

  “What are you going to do? Have him fired as well? Or reeducated? The man is already a Fascist.”

  His father scratched something in the notebook, closed and bound it, and said, “Noted.”

  Pietro looked at the Colonel sideways before leaning towards Angelo. “There is a lot at stake here, son. Ordering geological reports from Germany could truly be seen as treason if you put the results into the appeals. What you are proposing—what you said before Nicolo came in—would mean holding up projects that are already in progress. Consider the costs.”

  “Oh, I am.” Angelo smiled for the first time in weeks. He swept a palm towards his father. “I’m thinking about the well-being of companies just like his. I’m thinking about the long-term impacts on the economy.”

  “Angelo,” the Colonel barked. “Geological reports have been wrong before.”

  Angelo pretended to take his warning seriously. “That’s correct. They have been. Now you also understand why I intend to take careful precautions.”

  “What exactly are you proposing to do? Pietro, what did he tell you?”

  “Father.” Angelo leaned his elbows on his desk and looked him straight in the eyes. “I am proposing that you clean up your mess. Get through the hearings in one piece. Take a break. And then reinvent yourself. You’re not going to convince anyone of your projects right now.”

  The Colonel looked as if he had just been punched, but Angelo wasn’t finish
ed with him yet. “In the meantime, I will rehaul this department before it gets out of control. That’s not what I’m proposing to do. It’s what I have proposed. And before you interrupt me, you could try and replace me with someone else who is sloppier, more in your pocket, but…” He pulled out his trump card: the directives, signed, sealed, and approved. “The prime minister himself has already sent me this.”

  His father stared at him in disbelief, but Pietro had the start of a smile on his face.

  Angelo spelled it out for his father. “Mussolini has granted me full power to do as I see fit with your clean-up, Colonel. Gentlemen, for the time being, we’re finished here.”

  Chapter 11

  Arlund, April 1924

  H ans’s oxcart rolled past Arlund’s wayward cross, slush and snow piled on the sides of the road. The basket at Christ’s feet was still filled with dried musty flowers from last autumn. As Hans steered his ox down the curve towards Graun, Katharina stretched out in the hay in the back, Bernd and Annamarie next to her, and looked up at the sky. Her daughter copied her immediately, her smile checking for approval.

  “Look, Annamarie.” She pointed to the clouds above them, changing shapes in a wind they could not hear or feel. “That one looks like an eye. Do you see it?”

  Annamarie grinned and put two fingers to her eyes. “Occhio.”

  “That’s right: eye. Dov’è il tuo naso?”

  Annamarie put a finger to her nose, and Katharina grabbed her hand and kissed it.

  From up front, Hans greeted someone and reined in the ox. She sat up to look over the edge. It was the Ritsches.

  “Servus, Kaspar. Servus, Toni,” she called.

  They lifted their palms to her and came to the side of the cart. “Just saw Karl Spinner,” Kaspar said. “He got news from Germany that Hitler’s on trial. Doesn’t look good.”

  Toni spit snuff on the ground and scuffed his heel in the gravel. “Mighty disappointing. After that Beer Hall Putsch, we thought he stood a chance.”

  She glanced at Hans, but his face gave away nothing. Karl Spinner. Georg. The Ritsches. Even Florian most times. They all talked excitedly about Hitler and his politics, as if it had something to do with them. To her, Hitler seemed to be as much a fanatic as Mussolini. Just because he was German though, Hitler’s politics were acceptable to these men.

  Toni jerked his chin at her. “Going down to see Jutta?”

  She knelt back in the hay. Actually, it was Iris she was meeting. “Hans is. I have to see to some things in town.”

  The Ritsches took their leave, and Hans got the ox going again. Bless him, he never said a thing about Jutta and her. Katharina kept her distance these days. She and Jutta simply did not see eye to eye on things, and she was careful what she shared with her, especially after Jutta’s indiscretion in front of Florian. Most recently, Katharina heard rumours that the reason she was avoiding Jutta was because Katharina was jealous about her owning the inn whilst the Steinhausers were still waiting for the deed to the Thalerhof.

  That hurt Katharina more than Jutta’s slip of the tongue.

  At the church square, Katharina helped Annamarie down, and Hans told her he’d pick her up in a couple of hours to take them back home. She headed for the Foglios’ butcher shop, where Iris said she would wait after school. Aloud, Katharina was used to calling the butcher family by their Italian name, but in her head, she always thought of them as Blech-Foglio.

  She walked in, the little bell ringing on the door, and the scents of smoked meat and garlic were just underneath the smell of the bleach Mrs Blech-Foglio used to keep the shop spotless. Not a drop of blood on that woman’s hands, Jutta used to whisper when they’d walked in together.

  Behind the glass case was a tray of dried horse sausages, piled up on one another into an elongated pyramid. There was a hunk of Speck, with thick strips of fat, and another one with more flesh than fat, which was what Katharina preferred. Behind the butcher counter was a pork leg in a wooden contraption that Katharina had never seen before, like a skewer stuck the long way in a vice. The rind held a faded blue stamp, but she could not read it.

  From the stairwell that led to her room, Iris called cheerfully, “Come stai, Katharina.” She had Sebastiano by the hand, the Blech-Foglios’ youngest. “I’m so glad you’re here. It’s a nice day for a walk. Sebastiano can come with us and play with Annamarie.”

  Katharina kissed Iris on the cheeks, then warmly linked her arm with Iris’s. “It may be the only way we can talk about your wedding in peace.”

  The children were the same age, but Sebastiano was a little shorter than Annamarie.

  Iris reached for Bernd and took him into her arms, smiling and kissing his cheeks. Bernd’s face crumpled and, just as quickly, recovered in an uncertain smile.

  They stepped out into the spring air and turned for the lake, but Katharina stopped when she saw Rioba in the square. He was standing over one of his official’s shoulders, who was tacking something onto the wooden announcement board just outside the church.

  Iris raised an eyebrow and tipped her head. “It will be in Italian, but I’m here. Let’s go see the news.”

  “Let me try and guess what it says,” Katharina said. “I want to see how much I can manage on my own.”

  Iris agreed, looking pleased, but Katharina first waited until Rioba had adjusted his fez and returned with the man and the hammer to headquarters. Anything to avoid him cheerfully chucking Bernd under the chin, calling him Benito, or commenting on how beautiful her daughter was, or something about Katharina’s Italian.

  Iris walked up first and began reading, and Katharina started with the headline. When she read the words Ministerio il Genio Civile, her eyes flew to the bottom. Angelo Grimani’s name and a neat signature were there in black and white. Her heart pounded so much she was certain Iris could hear it and see it coming out of her chest.

  “Katharina, you need my help?”

  “No, Iris. No. Let me.” The words swam before her, and she scolded herself for being so affected. It was an announcement for the whole community, not a private message for her from Angelo. She read the sentences and strung the words she knew into something that might make sense. They were going to stop the dam. She felt out of breath. Behind her, she heard Jutta’s voice calling to someone, probably Hans or Alois. “Iris, it’s about our lake. Tell me, are they putting a stop to the reservoir plans here? It says something about the Gleno too.”

  Iris had a curious look on her face. “Katharina, you wrote to this man once. I remember.” She pointed to the announcement. “Was it a protest, what you wrote?”

  “Tell me what he…what it says.”

  Iris switched to German. “It says that, especially because of the Gleno Dam break last year, the ministry is holding back all projects. They have to, come se dice…review? Sì, review safety ways. How to build the dam, capisce?”

  They looked back at the tacked-on sheet.

  “So,” Katharina said, “nothing is going to happen?”

  Iris shrugged. Then a slow smile spread across her face. “You did this?”

  “I’m afraid not. It was the accident at the Gleno that caused this. Not me.”

  He’d never written her back. She’d often wondered whether he’d ever gotten the letter.

  “The men from Munich were here, remember?” Iris said.

  Then likely Angelo had indeed received her plea. “And the soil testing team from Bolzano,” Katharina thought out loud. She looked at her daughter, playing with Sebastiano near a mound of snow. “So it’s over.”

  “I think so.” Iris smiled.

  “I should tell the others about this.” Katharina looked over at the garden of the Post Inn. Jutta was standing at the back gate, her hands on her waist, watching them.

  “There is your compagno, your ally,” Iris said. “We can go tell her now.”

  Jutta jerked her chin in their direction, straightened, then slowly raised a hand in a kind of greeting.

  Katha
rina lifted hers in return. She missed Jutta, but how could she bridge the distance now?

  She turned back to Iris. “Maybe later.”

  “She will never be happy to see me, eh? My future cognata, my sister-in-law.”

  Katharina took Iris by the arm again and leaned into her. “Don’t you worry about that. Let’s walk to the lake. I’m here to talk about your wedding plans, not problems with in-laws.”

  She took one last look at Angelo Grimani’s name and then at Annamarie, who—with Sebastiano—was throwing dirty clumps of snow into the melting puddles to make them splash.

  ***

  N ext morning, the sky was a bright pink and vanilla when Katharina stepped outside. Bernd was still sleeping, and she placed his basket on the bench outside the door, under the eaves. Annamarie squatted on the ground, one of Katharina’s wooden clogs in her hand, petting the brown cowhide upper as if it were a pet. Katharina pried it away from her and slid into the shoes, Annamarie jumping up and following at her heels into the yard.

  Patches of green grass were exposed between the melting snow in the fields, and the sky was still pink from the dawn. She led Annamarie to the chicken coop and had her scatter the food while she searched one out for soup. The black speckled one was a good pick. She cornered it against the fence and let it do its little jig: left, right, left, right, left, grab! She had her fingers deep in the feathers on its back and swung it into her arms. The chicken clucked nervously, and Katharina soothed and stroked it until it stopped its struggle.

  In the yard, she picked up the axe to do away with the head, Hund already near the old tree stump that served as their chopping block. She wiped her brow and looked at the dog, then to where Annamarie was gathering eggs.

  Four years ago. It was four years ago since she’d found Angelo’s blood trail, had followed it to Karl Spinner’s hut.

  She lifted the axe over the chicken, surprised by the sudden loss of strength in her arms before bringing it down on the bird’s neck. Blood spurted and the body jerked, but she held it down tight.