Street Boys (3 page)

Connors tossed his gear into the jeep and jumped in behind the wheel. He turned the ignition key and started the engine, shifting gears from neutral to first. Then, for the only time that day, the bullmastiff barked, loud and often, running toward the jeep as he did, staring up at Connors with round, pasta-bowl eyes. Connors kept both hands on the steering wheel, his own eyes fixed on the empty road leading into Naples. He took one hand off the wheel, reached into his shirt pocket and pulled out a piece of gum. He unfolded the wrapper and shoved the slice deep into a corner of his mouth. He turned to look at the bullmastiff, now sitting alongside the jeep. They stared at one another for several moments, the sun bearing down hard.

“Get in,” Connors said, reaching back to pat the rear seat. “Take you as far as Naples. After that, you’re back on your own.”

“Are you nuts?” Taylor asked. “We can’t take a dog with us. It’s against any orders anybody would ever give.”

“He could be a help,” Willis said.

“Another wilted mind heard from,” Taylor said, turning to glare at Willis in the backseat. “How the hell is a dog going to be any help? Wounded one to boot.”

“He might know his way around the city,” Connors said. “Sure to know it better than we do. Besides, it’ll give Willis something else to look at other than the back of your scrawny neck.”

“Which, I should mention, if it gets any redder I could heat my lunch on it,” Willis said.

“Give him some space,” Connors said. “He’ll need room to drool.”

Connors watched as the mastiff jumped into the backseat, his 140-pound girth taking up a solid portion of the rear, and nestled alongside Willis. “They grow dogs big around here,” he said, looking toward the road, turning the wheel to the left, grinding the clutch into gear, scattering patches of dry grass and dust in his wake, riding along the tree lines. “I hope the same isn’t true about the women.”

5

SANTA CATERINA A FORMIELLO, NAPLES
SEPTEMBER 26, 1943

The two boys knelt before the main altar of the old church, their heads bowed in prayer. The church, with its tilted dome and boxlike design, was a cherished remnant of the Renaissance, built in 1593 by Romolo Balsimelli, an obscure architect who never planned on his work standing for centuries, defiant in the face of war and neglect. The church was cool, dark and silent, the whispers of the two boys echoing off the stone walls and shattered windows.

“I can still smell the bowls of Mama’s lentils,” said Giancarlo Bardini, at twelve, the older by two years, sitting in a straw chair facing the main altar. “Me eating them with a spoon and you with bread.”

“Is Uncle Mario with us, too?” Antonio asked. He was shivering, huddled close to his brother, back of his head leaning against the top rung of his chair.

“Always,” Giancarlo said to him with a smile.

“And Nonna Maria?”

“In her chair, fanning herself,” Giancarlo said.

The older boy stood and looked around the empty, dust-filled church. “We need to go and join the others,” he said. “We don’t want to be left behind.”

“Just one more prayer,” Antonio said. “The one I always save for Mama.”

Giancarlo nodded, watching his brother walk the three steps up to the altar. “You say more prayers than a priest,” he whispered.

Antonio stretched his small frame across the base of the altar, stretching to reach the large cross resting in the center. His small hands gripped the base of the heavy cross, bedded down with jewels and sparkling stones. He slid it closer toward him, easing it across the smooth surface of the cold marble, and tilted it toward his face. As he reached up to kiss the crucified body of Christ, he saw the wires attached to the base of the cross and heard the click of the mechanism that snapped the fuse of the mine. Antonio let go of the cross, stepped back and turned to look at Giancarlo for one final time, his wide and frightened eyes telling him what they both already knew.

The explosion rocked the church to its foundation. Thick shards of marble and wood flew through the air, mixing in a violent dance with the shattered columns and broken glass hurtling toward the ceiling that was lined with a painting of Saint Catherine, her arms spread wide, surrounded by angels riding on puffs of clouds. Below her, buried under the collapsed altar and the mounds of destruction set off by the blast of a German mine, the bodies of Antonio and Giancarlo Bardini lay facedown and still, the darkened remains of the cross resting between them.

Their war had finally found its end.

6

MAIN STREET OUTSIDE THE CHURCH OF SANTA CATERINA
A FORMIELLO, NAPLES. SEPTEMBER 26, 1943

Vincenzo and Franco lead a slow-moving contingent of two hundred or so boys and girls through the empty streets of Naples. They walked with their heads down and in silence, the few belongings they had left bundled up inside of old shirts and flung over their shoulders. “When do you think we can come back?” Franco asked, wiping sweat from his brow with a torn rag.

“Maybe never,” Vincenzo said.

The front door of the church blasted open. Shards of marble, wood and shattered glass embraced the street. Vincenzo and Franco scattered to the ground, covering their heads against the force of the fiery blast. Behind them, the other children scampered for any visible signs of cover, thick streams of smoke covering them like a warm brown blanket. A large marble statue of Saint Catherine was knocked off its pedestal and fell facedown across the front of the church entryway, splintering into two large chunks.

Vincenzo got to his feet and waded through the burning smoke, making his way to the front entrance, now nothing more than a small wall of silent flames. He stood there for several long seconds, the smoke washing past him, the fire licking at his legs and arms, before stepping into the remains of the church. He walked past the crumpled piles of wood and stone, rays of sunlight slicing in through the cracks in the stained-glass windows from above. He stopped in front of the main altar, its thick marble split in two, one side resting at a slant, its sharp ends imbedded against a side wall. A thin river of smoke floated past his legs and his eyes were tinged red from the heat and flames. He shifted his feet and brushed against a rolled-up set of rosary beads. Vincenzo bent down, dropped his hand into the clouds of smoke and picked them up. He stared at them, letting the beads rest against the sides of his fingers. He closed his hands around them, bowed his head, turned and walked out of the church.

He stepped through the charred opening and walked past Franco and Angela, ignoring the faces of the boys and girls who stood in a large huddle around the front entrance and walked back toward the center of the city. “Where are you going?” Franco asked.

“I’m staying,” Vincenzo said, not bothering to turn or lift his head.

“And do what?” Franco asked.

Vincenzo stopped, gazed at the faces that surrounded him, frightened and confused, all grouped together on an empty street across from a burning church. He took a deep breath, the smoke still burning his lungs, and looked at Franco. “Kill as many of them who come back as I can. Until they kill me.”

“You walk into a grave if you do that,” Franco said, stepping closer to him, Angela by his side.

“If I’m going to die, I’ll die here,” Vincenzo said. “In my city. On my streets.”

Vincenzo looked up at the black smoke billowing from the church and then into the eyes of the faces surrounding him. He lowered his head, turned slowly and walked back down the center of the street.

Franco and Angela watched him go. They stood in silence, their breath coming in spurts, their faces and necks tinged with sweat. They looked at each other and nodded, then started to walk toward Vincenzo, following him back into the heart of the city. The crowd of more than two hundred milled nervously about, mumbling in low tones or exchanging furtive glances, apprehension and indecision the rule of the moment. Then, the wave back began. Three boys broke from the pack and followed Franco and Angela. Soon, five more trailed them. And then another five. Then, eight others gathered their belongings and shifted direction.

In all, it took less than fifteen minutes for the entire band of street boys and girls to turn and begin a slow walk back to nowhere.

7

PALAZZO CESARINO, NAPLES
SEPTEMBER 26, 1943

Carlo Maldini stood against the side of a broken window and stared down at the street below. He took a long drink from a half-empty bottle of wine. He watched the flames bring down the walls of what had once been his favorite church, too used to violence to be moved by what he saw, unaware that two boys had perished in the blast, all in the quest for a silent prayer. Maldini was fifty-six years old, dark hair tinged white at the sides, face speckled with the remnants of a three-day growth. He was thin but muscular, bones built solid after many years spent running a railroad engine for the Italian National Service. His clothes were old, torn and in need of a cleaning. On most days, Maldini was too deep into his wine to notice.

The burdens of war had turned Carlo Maldini into a weathered man with a sad face. Benito Mussolini’s dream of an Italian empire spanning continents had cost Carlo a wife and two sons and filled him with an anger and frustration that bordered on madness. He rubbed a soot-smeared hand across his forehead and gulped down another mouthful of wine. He had spent many a Sunday in that church, walking side by side with his family, their heads bowed in solemn prayer, listening to soft words of peace spoken by a priest too young to comprehend the eventual price of war.

He gazed up the street and watched the large group of children march back down the main road, their final destination unknown to him. He turned his head and stared across at the young woman standing with her arms folded and her eyes focused on the activity below. She looked so beautiful in the early-morning sunlight that filtered in through the huge holes in what was left of their home. From where he stood, staring at her through the glazed effect of one too many bottles of wine, the woman looked exactly like her mother. She had long dark strands of hair gently brushing the tops of her shoulders, a round, unlined face filled with the power and passion of her youth, and olive-shaped eyes that could easily burn a hole through the very soul of a man. Her name was Nunzia. She was twenty years old and his daughter, the only child he had left to lose.

Maldini could not leave Naples when the Germans had ordered the evacuation of the city. He was too drunk and too crammed with rage even to move. He cowered in the basement of his building, hiding behind long-discarded bureaus, his Nunzia at his side.

“We must go,” she had said to him. “We’ll hide in the mountains and then make our way north, up toward the Americans.”

Maldini could only mumble senseless words about a family he no longer had and happier days he would no longer see. He tried pushing his daughter away, struggling to free himself of her grip. “I won’t leave you here,” Nunzia said, her tender voice filled with defiance.

“There’s nothing left for me, little angel,” Maldini said to her, a sad smile crossing his lips, one hand gently caressing his daughter’s hair. “I have my wine and my memories. That’s all a man like me needs.”

“I’m staying by your side, Papa,” Nunzia said.

“Your mother was stubborn,” Maldini said, a rush of madness in his voice. “She wouldn’t leave either, not when I asked her to.
Begged
her to. And now she’s dead. They’re all dead. And those that aren’t will soon join them.”

“Then we will die here, Papa,” Nunzia said. “In Naples, where you belong. Where we
both
belong.”

“You don’t belong with a drunk,” Maldini said.

“I belong with my father,” Nunzia replied.

Maldini swallowed a long drink of wine and rubbed the visions from his eyes. He stared at his daughter as she turned her look toward him.

“What will they do?” Nunzia asked.

“Something foolish, no doubt,” Maldini said.

“I heard a rumor in the piazza yesterday,” Nunzia said. “From Signora Matturano. She told me while we were pulling up water from the well.”

Maldini rested his head against a cracked wall and snickered. “Americans are in Salerno fighting,” he said. “Nazi soldiers are spread throughout Italy. And what are the Italians doing? Spreading rumors. If medals were given out for gossip and rumors, Italy would be crowned champion every year.”

“She said the Nazis were coming back,” Nunzia said, ignoring her father’s sarcasm.

“Let them come,” Maldini said with an indifferent shrug. “There’s nothing left for them to take.”

Maldini took a long swig of the wine and rested the bottle on the wooden sill. He stared out the window as the caravan of children began to disappear from view. “And how does Signora Matturano know all this?” he asked. “Did the Nazis call and tell her?”

“She said there were leaflets dropped from planes,” Nunzia said. “Her grandson, Franco, showed her one. He’s in that group of children down there. I can take you to meet them. I know where they’ll sleep tonight.”

Maldini looked away from the window and stared at his daughter. “Why would I want to do something so crazy?” he asked.

“To help them, Papa,” she said. “In case the Nazis come back.”

“Help them get
killed
!” Maldini shouted, his voice echoing off the barren walls. “Have I not seen enough of my own blood lost? Now you ask me to put the lives of strangers on my head, too. Leave it as it is, little one. Each to his own destiny.”

“If they’re staying and the Germans are coming back, they’ll be forced to fight,” Nunzia said, not backing down. “With your help or without. If that happens, most of them will die.”

“That’s a decision for them to make,” Maldini said. “Not for me. Take a good look at me, Nunzia. Open your eyes and look beyond your father and see instead the madman who sits in his place. Then tell me, what help can that be to any man or boy?”

“You can tell them what they don’t know, Papa,” Nunzia said, stepping closer to her father.

“And what is it you think this old drunk knows, little girl?” Maldini asked.

“You know about the guns,” Nunzia said.