Between Enemies (5 page)

With the outbreak of war the exchange of letters between Grandma and her mathematician London friends had become more intense. At the end of the summer of 1917, after the eleventh Battle of the Isonzo, she had a visit from one of them, by the name of Sir James, who spoke good Italian because he had lived for a while in Tripoli. He was a tall, thin man with snow-white hair and an impressive nose. He smoked great rolls of foul-smelling tobacco and wore grey pullovers, never a jacket or a tie. I don’t know what they talked about, but they spent the evenings together, and several times I came across them strolling along the stream. They often went all the way to the old mill, and Sir James always came back with a bag of flour for Teresa’s store-cupboard. One thing was abundantly clear to me: the two of them shared more than their common passion for mathematics, which they managed to talk about even at
dinner, raising more than one protest from Grandpa.

During those days Grandma seemed to have shed twenty years. On one occasion I came across the ‘two old sticks’ – a definition coined, not without malicious intent, by Grandpa – nattering under the chestnut tree in the garden. They were speaking in hushed tones. I had hidden behind a box-bush which Teresa trimmed and cared for like a son, but I was in for a complete let-down. The subject of their animated, whispered conversation was the shutters of the three-mullioned sixteenth-century window in the façade of the Villa overlooking the village piazza, and the underclothing we all wear, associated for some reason with the washing lines stretched across the courtyard at the back of the building.

Five

T
ERESA BROUGHT ME A BOWL OF HOT MILK BARELY TINTED
with black barley. ‘Drink up, before these Krauts pinch the lot!’ Then, seeing her daughter tidying her hair reflected in the water in the sink, she burst out: ‘Stop admiring yourself, Loretta, don’t you know it’s Old Nick who combs hair!’ She knew her daughter was vacuous, and that it’s hard to do much with a vacuum.

I drank my milk and barley at a draught, got to my feet and stepped round Teresa. She was a mule of a woman, with greyish complexion and a long chin, shoulders custom built for burdens, and a grimace of rage mingled with soot. She was a noble, obstinate animal, tamed only if you knew how to get on her right side, a gift which only Grandma and Aunt Maria seemed to possess.

A loud outcry rang through the kitchen. Then another, then a third. I was already at the door when Renato’s arm barred my way.

‘Don’t go out. Aunt’s orders.’

‘What’s going on?’

‘The men from the church have served their sentence and the sub-lieutenant has told the troops the captain is packing the lot of them off to Monte Grappa. There’s a hint of rebellion in the air. But nothing will come of it – this lot were born in uniform.’ Renato lowered his pipe. ‘They think this is unfair punishment, but he is their C.O. so nothing will come of it. If
he knows his stuff he’ll allow them to let off steam, and in half an hour it’ll all be over.’

The soldiers’ voices grew more numerous, some coming even from the inner courtyard.

‘They’re getting off lightly, these Krauts,’ said Teresa as she dried the last dish.

‘Lightly? Monte Grappa?’ The steward rammed his pipe back in his mouth. ‘It’s hell on earth up on that mountain.’

I really liked that man. I was used to seeing people from above; at seventeen I was already a metre seventy, but he towered over me. Everything about him seemed to speak to me. His appearance, the look in his eyes, the quick, strong movements of his arms, even his limp. If he was the steward at the Villa…But who was he really? Why did Grandma think so highly of him? Even Aunt Maria hung on his lips, a privilege I had never seen her grant to anyone.

‘Like a bowl of milk, Renato?’ asked Loretta.

‘Be quiet, girl,’ snapped Teresa, flaring her nostrils.

‘But…Mum…’

‘Quiet, I tell you!’

The soldiers’ voices grew louder and louder, interrupted at intervals by sharp orders.

‘Signor Manca, won’t you let me in?’

It was Giulia with her hair bundled up under a fur hat. She was wearing a jacket with a fur collar, and her trousers were rolled up over a pair of riding boots. I had never seen her in such a get-up, but Giulia was Giulia and no one showed any surprise at her odd breeches.

Renato stepped aside, and she came in saying, ‘I’ll light the fire.’

‘The fire is my job,’ said Teresa, stooping over the firewood.

To help her mother, Loretta moved the swinging arm on which hung the cauldron. It squeaked and Teresa gave a snort. All of a sudden the voices of the soldiers fell silent.

‘Just you see, they’ll get off scot free, this rabble!’

Loretta couldn’t take her eyes off Renato’s face, his hands, his manly chest.

‘What is it these youngsters put into your noddle?’ grunted Teresa. ‘Beelzebub’s business, that’s what.’

Giulia smiled, looking hard at the steward.

‘Would you like some milk?’ I asked her.

She lifted the gasmask to her face, then lowered it again and bared her teeth.

‘We could do with a walk,’ I added in a shaky voice.

‘I’ll have a bowl of milk first.’

Giulia took the bowl from Loretta’s hands and I went upstairs to fetch my overcoat. I said hello to Grandpa who told me to take care, and when I came down again I saw only Teresa and her daughter at the fireplace. This surprised me. I went outside, and as I closed the door I glimpsed a pout on Loretta’s face. Giulia and Renato were at the gate talking to a sentry who had ordered arms. Renato was waving his pipe in front of his face. The soldier was laughing. I started towards them.

‘Come along quick,’ said Giulia, coming to meet me. ‘That fellow’s asking too many questions.’

We set off. To my surprise and disappointment I found that Renato, despite his limp, was as agile as an ibex.

We climbed up towards the cemetery, passed the front of the church, and then took to the main road. There was still the sweetish whiff of corpses, whether of man or of mule, and still wrecks of carts and lorries, though many had been cleared away over the last few days. Every so often we spotted a line of
prisoners, easy to distinguish by the unmistakable Adrian steel helmets weighing down their heads. They were raking the fields and filling huge sacks with fragments of the flesh and bones of men and beasts all jumbled together. But when in the grass they came across a human head those makeshift undertakers stopped for a moment, crossed themselves to a man, and a metal chest was set down beside those pathetic remains.

Giulia was on ahead. Renato and I, instead, were walking side by side. It began to snow. Just a little at first, but then heavily.

‘Let’s get back,’ said Renato.

Giulia, four steps ahead of us, had begun to fool around with her pet gasmask. Renato reached into his pocket and took out a flask of grappa. He held it out to me. I shook my head. But I was cold, and when he had taken a long swig and was shoving it back in his pocket I asked for a drop.

‘A little more and you’ll become a regular Alpino.’

‘Just a year to go for that…but right now we’re in Germany.’

‘This bloody war isn’t going to last a year.’

‘Do you mean we’ve lost it?’

‘I didn’t say that. The armies might hold out but not the empires, they’ve run out of steam.’ He put the flask back and rammed his pipe into his mouth. ‘The Central Powers, the Western Powers, all of them are broken winded.’ He stabbed the mouthpiece in the direction of Giulia as he gave me a clout on the back. ‘You fancy the young lady, eh?’

Six

T
ERESA’S STUBBY FINGERS SMOOTHED THE WRINKLES OUT
of the lace on the little table. ‘Is it all right here, madam?’

‘Yes, it’s just right there. A small table for a grand occasion.’

‘Those poor girls. Who ever will take those poor girls now?’ Teresa waved her open palms towards the ceiling.

‘Don Lorenzo has taken them to a convent near Feltre,’ said Donna Maria. ‘But we have many more troubles ahead of us… and when those poor girls come back there will be a lot else to think about, and a lot to be done.’

‘But those medallions round the neck of a dog…’

Donna Maria had moved to the window. ‘Put on a bit more wood, Teresa. It’s getting chilly.’ She stroked the thick, rough woollen shawl that fell over her still firm, fine bosom. ‘Put out the German’s soup tureen as well as his silver…he’ll have stolen them from some other Italian house. Those bastards,’ and she lowered her voice, ‘call looting a requisite of war. They have a nerve.’

‘They ought to be shot,’ grumbled Teresa, and vanished through the doorway.

Aunt made a tour of the room lighting one candle after another. She told me she was going to ask the captain to provide more paraffin for the lamps. She used the bellows to liven up the fire burning on the terracotta firedogs, embossed with the
faces of two centurions wearing helmets not unlike those of the Prussians. And she began to talk about the eagle of the Roman legions, of the two-headed eagle of the Hapsburgs, and the German eagle. ‘No one uses the horse as a crest,’ she said with a smile. ‘And the horse is the noblest of animals, the one all armies exploit, even unto death.’

‘Even the Americans have an eagle, Aunt.’

Grandma Nancy burst in without knocking. ‘It’s all the fault of Rome,’ she said. ‘All these countries have the Scipio complex.’ Grandma liked history and politics almost as much as mathematics. ‘If we of the gentle sex were in command, wars would be made for self-interest, or perhaps for reasons of jealousy.’ And her eyes fixed on me. ‘You men, though, make war to show off your strength, you like killing, you act like brainless children almost all your lives, especially when you stop playing, which is in fact the only serious thing you do well. Don’t be in any hurry to grow up, my boy.’

The two women exchanged glances. Grandma’s face had the strong features of an ardent race, fierce Border raiders accustomed to command; while my aunt’s warm eyes, set between prominent eyebrows and cheekbones, held a grave look of loneliness, gracefully borne though it was.

‘If I didn’t know you so well I’d think you were out to seduce someone.’

Donna Maria responded with a wan smile. ‘I’ve invited Captain Korpium to dinner.’

Grandma stiffened. ‘I thought I had enjoined silence.’

‘I want those men shot.’

‘It’s none of our business. Why are you poking your nose in?’

Donna Maria put her fingertips to her cheeks. ‘You must understand…I have to do it…or at least try.’

Grandma was aware of Aunt’s deep-seated melancholy. ‘I would prefer to be informed next time.’ She turned and reached the door without deigning to glance at me. Her dress with its shot blue reflections rustled on the parquet. The candlelight flickered ever so slightly.

The moon was already high when Loretta announced the German.

‘Come in, Captain,’ said Donna Maria, upright with one hand on the mantelpiece and the other touching the ivory brooch conspicuous against the dark blue of her long dress, with its lace collar caressing her chin.

Korpium clicked his heels and stood for a long moment at attention, his cap under his arm. ‘Thank you for the invitation, Madame,’ he said, accompanying the words with a nervous little bow.

‘Please be seated, Captain.’

They sat down face to face, Loretta standing beside her mistress and Teresa beside the captain. And the dance began.

I followed the scene from a hiding place – we called it ‘Grandpa’s cubby-hole’ because he kept his cache of cognac there – where I had concealed myself with the complicity of Teresa. Not even Loretta was in the know. Teresa was very fond of me, spoiling me by making me biscuits and doing me almost countless favours, which I repaid with smiles and – every now and again – a few ten-minute sessions devoted to listening to her woes. There in Grandpa’s cubby-hole Grandma and Aunt Maria had stacked old rugs and rolls of cloth, a dozen table-lamps, a tiny showcase containing three broken teeth – the brass plate read ‘Relic of the Thirteenth Century’ – and a burst armchair in which I accommodated myself. I had a good view of
the little table through a hole in the wooden door where a knot had fallen out. This hole was a thumb’s width, so I didn’t even have to put my eye to it, while it was concealed by the yellowed gauze hung from the ceiling to hide the cracks.

‘I see that you are wearing regulation uniform.’ Aunt’s voice bore a trace of vexation.

The captain coughed into his gloved hand. ‘A soldier takes pride in his war uniform, though this is a profession at which your people do not shine.’

Donna Maria responded with an artful smile. ‘Perhaps we should stop fencing, don’t you think, Captain?’

The captain screwed in his monocle: ‘Touché, Madame.’

‘On the Piave, though, you have met with some resistance.’

The captain dropped his monocle into his left palm. ‘Shall we savour the Marzemino, Madame?’

‘With pleasure. Indeed, I must thank you for not having commandeered our demijohns.’

The captain poured two fingers of wine into Donna Maria’s glass.

‘Are you so very attached to your headgear, Captain?’

Korpium realized he still had his cap under his arm. He handed it to Teresa. ‘I am jittery. Punishing these men…’

‘Punishing? And in what manner, for goodness’ sake?’

The captain removed his gloves and handed them also to Teresa. Then, clearing his throat, he said quietly: ‘I am posting them to Monte Grappa. The men say that whoever goes up there doesn’t come back down.’

‘You ought to shoot them,’ said Aunt in a firm, clear voice. ‘An example needs to be set.’

The captain pretended not to have heard, and helped himself to a ladleful of the steaming risotto which Loretta was offering
him. Then, following my aunt’s lead, he swallowed a mouthful and his features relaxed. ‘I have demoted them and transferred them to the most dangerous section of the front line. They have been with me for a year.’

‘Those medallions round the dogs’ necks. How cheap!’

‘It was…unworthy…on the part of those men. I knew them all personally. They knew their job. I have led them in attacks on enemy trenches. They had iron truncheons and daggers and… How do you say it…guts! Yes, they had guts! It was a great grief to me to punish them, but discipline is discipline. Do not let it distress you, Madame. The priest removed the girls at once, and you will see, the village will soon forget it.’