Freefall
Page 33
Rione XVI district was a short walk from the station. Dawn found him there, camped beneath a leafless plane tree across the road from his uncle Rodolfo’s house. The property was closed up, the door locked, the windows shuttered, and his knocks went unanswered. All morning he waited, shivering in the December wind, while hunger gnawed at his stomach and cats scavenged in the gutter. Eventually a woman pedalled up on a bicycle, produced keys from her belt and let herself in. He rose stiffly to his feet, crossed the road and knocked once more.
‘Signor and Signora Zambon have moved away,’ she said, eyeing him suspiciously. ‘Since all the trouble.’
‘Trouble.’
‘The overthrow. Rioting and that.’
‘Where?’
‘North somewhere. Milan. The new government. Who are you?’
‘Nobody. The daughter – Renata?’
‘Gone all radical. Lives in some Communist doss house in the Tenth. Works for one of the new parties. I forget which; there are so many.’
‘You... you’re the housekeeper.’
‘That’s right. I look in on the place, pick up the mail, keep an eye out for trouble. Talking of which, do I know you?’
‘I... came to see, the patrona. The grandmother. Ellie, I mean Eleanora.’
‘Signora Ladurner?’ The eyes narrowed. ‘She died months ago.’
He flinched. ‘What?’
‘In the summer. At the infermeria. Her mind went. Then she caught the polmonite and that was that. Listen, I’m sure I know you from somewhere...’
He turned and walked away, cast adrift with the severing of the last mooring. He wandered, without purpose or direction, for hours, and then days, criss-crossing the city like a leaf in the breeze. Time and place ceased to have meaning. The streets were either in light or darkness, the weather cold, or colder: none of it mattered. If he needed food he scavenged scraps or joined vagrants at the soup kitchen; if he wanted sleep he found a shop doorway or lay on a bench wrapped in newspaper. When the police stopped him he pulled Corlotta’s pay book from his pocket and they waved him on. Occasionally people gave him food, or pressed coins into his hands. One woman gave him her dead son’s mittens; a priest gave him a scarf and invited him into his church for a night. Others were hostile, scolding him for his laziness or cursing the army’s ineptitude. At one point, standing in line at a soup kitchen, a voice started shouting angrily and he found himself corralled into a street-clearing party amid other former soldati. He remained with them a few days, toiling with picks and shovels to clear the debris caused by the Allied bombs. Then, picking through the rubble of a ruined house one morning, he lifted masonry to see a child’s hand reaching to him from below. Cold, dusty and lifeless, he could only kneel amid the wreckage tightly holding it and weeping uncontrollably until the others pulled him off.
After that he began moving again. Away from Rome, slowly, randomly but always vaguely south, as though pulled on a slender thread. He walked the quieter routes, avoiding main roads in favour of farm tracks and hill passes. By now winter was upon the Apennines and the war in suspension as both sides dug in to wait for spring. Occasionally he saw signs of a patrol, or came across discarded equipment, or heard aircraft passing, but the weather was his main threat now, and repeatedly he found himself struggling through wind-ravaged valleys, fording icy rivers or wading through snow up to his thighs. Progress was slow, his ebbing strength made it slower, and when the storms struck, it stopped altogether and he was forced to shelter in shepherds’ huts or farm buildings. Sometimes he knocked on doors and begged food or a roof; mostly he chose to proceed alone, safely cloaked in his solitude.
Driven by demons, steered by instinct, his journey went on. Then one evening, two weeks after leaving Rome, and following a day-long mountain slog through heavy weather, a worsening storm forced him to descend in search of shelter. Exhausted and starving, he staggered down to the treeline and entered thick woodland. There, slithering and stumbling blindly, he looked for crags or crevices to shelter in, or a boulder to burrow behind, while the wind shrieked in torment all round and jostling trees crowded him, swaying and twisting like crazed dancers. And as the darkness gathered and his fatigue overcame him, he knew his journey was done, and the struggle over, and he sank to the ground in grateful release, to await the end.
Then he heard a noise. Like a trumpet calling, or a distant ship, or a horn blown in warning, floating to him faintly on the storm, like a raft on the ocean.
A bull.
He struggled to his feet, and set off down through the woods one final time. After a while the ground began to level beneath his boots, and then he broke out of the trees and into the open and blasts of icy wind stung his face and eyes. Bowing his head, he pushed on towards the roaring sound. He came to flat pasture, thick white with snow, and skirted round to an empty field bounded by posts. This led to a buried track, where shapes began emerging through the drifting white. Chicken huts and pig shelters, then a ramshackle shed and another pen. And within this, tethered to a post, its coat long and shaggy, its broad back blanketed with snow, its huge hooves caked in mud and ice, stood the bull. It eyed him idly for a moment, jaws chewing slowly, before tilting its head back and releasing its trumpet roar once more. A crack of light appeared further on, framing a hunched figure holding a lantern. ‘Chi va là?’ it demanded shrilly. Who goes there? He stumbled towards it.
‘God’s holy name be praised,’ Rosa said, seizing his arm. ‘Our prayers are answered.’
We hope you enjoyed this book.
Robert Radcliffe’s next book is coming in spring 2019.
For more information, click the following links
About Robert Radcliffe
The Airborne Series
An Invitation from the Publisher
About Robert Radcliffe
ROBERT RADCLIFFE was born and educated in London. A journalist and advertising copywriter, he also spent ten years flying as a commercial pilot.
His first novel, A Ship Called Hope, was published in 1994. In 1997 he sold his house and business and moved to a cottage in France to write. The result was The Lazarus Child, a book that sold more than a million copies worldwide.
In 2002 he published Under An English Heaven which was a Sunday Times top ten bestseller. This was followed by Upon Dark Waters (2004), Across the Blood-Red Skies (2009), Dambuster (2011) and Beneath Another Sun (2012). Other works include theatre drama and a BBC radio play. Airborne (2017) is his eighth novel. Robert and his wife Kate, a teacher, live in Suffolk.
The Airborne Series
Find out more
Find out more
Also by Robert Radcliffe…
A Ship Called Hope
The Lazarus Child
Under An English Heaven
Upon Dark Waters
Across the Blood Red Skies
Dambuster
Beneath Another Sun
Visit Head of Zeus now
An Invitation from the Publisher
We hope you enjoyed this book. We are an independent publisher dedicated to discovering brilliant books, new authors and great storytelling. Please join us at www.headofzeus.com and become part of our community of book-lovers.
We will keep you up to date with our latest books, author blogs, special previews, tempting offers, chances to win signed editions and much more.
Get in touch: hello@headofzeus.com
Visit Head of Zeus now
Find us on Twitter
Find us on Facebook
Find us on BookGrail
First published in the UK in 2018 by Head of Zeus Ltd
Copyright © Standing Bear Ltd, 2018
The moral right of Robert Radcliffe to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, o
r otherwise, without the prior permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
This is a work of fiction. All characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
9 7 5 3 1 2 4 6 8
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN (HB) 9781784973865
ISBN (XTPB) 9781784973872
ISBN (E) 9781784973858
Head of Zeus Ltd
First Floor East
5–8 Hardwick Street
London EC1R 4RG
www.headofzeus.com
Table of Contents
Welcome Page
About Freefall
Contents
Dedication
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
About Robert Radcliffe
The Airborne Series
An Invitation from the Publisher
Copyright
Table of Contents
Welcome Page
About Freefall
Contents
Dedication
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
About Robert Radcliffe
The Airborne Series
An Invitation from the Publisher
Copyright